Automated System Smoothes Out GI Bill Applications

September 7, 2010 - To say the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) had problems with the Post-9/11 GI Bill last year would be an understatement. This year they took a different approach to avoid those problems by changing how they process the education benefit claims for those veterans attending college. To avoid the issues they had last year, the VA now processes claims with a fully automated system.

Formally the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act, the new GI Bill system uses rules engine software to increase the number of claims examiners can handle. Under the new system, examiners will be able to process up to 10,000 claims per day, whereas under the previous system, examiners processed approximately 2,000 a day.

The new GI Bill has expanded benefits for veterans seeking a college education. The previous GI Bill paid one rate, which was supposed to cover tuition. The new GI Bill, however, will base veterans' tuition benefits on two criteria: how long the veteran served, and the highest rate of tuition at a public college in the veteran's home state. Veterans are also given housing stipends, which are calculated on the cost of living over hundreds of zip codes. The new software will perform the necessary calculations and determine the veteran's amount of aid.

The VA has already received almost 15% more claims for the fall semester than last year. There are still some steps in the overall process that will be automated eventually, but for now, the system will work much better than it did last fall, which is a step in the right direction.