Noteboom The Law Firm

VA Faces Overhaul of Iraq and Afghanistan War Veterans Claims

According to an article on The Herald Online, Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans are filing disability compensation claims at rates much faster than veterans of any other war, making it difficult for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to keep up.

What this likely means for the VA, is a payout that is much higher than it has ever been for any previous generation or war. One thing that is also being discovered is there are vast inconsistencies between disability payments for identical ailments depending on the region of the country in which the claims are made. Recent reports have described the payments as being “wildly uneven.”

At the same time, the speed in which the VA is processing disability claims has slowed while its rate of errors has increased. The VA’s goal, for fiscal 2011, was a 2% error rate, but a 16% error rate is what it ended up as.

The VA has hired almost 3,000 new workers in an attempt to combat their disability compensation processing issues. Since World War II, however, there’s a “lag” in disability payments that extends past the point in time when the last bullet is fired, which will probably be mimicked in the current wars as well. This is because not every disability is immediately apparent, and some take years to develop, necessitating a claim being made well after a veterans’ service has ended.

If you are a disabled veteran who has been denied disability compensation or have not yet applied for benefits from the VA, a South Florida disability attorney from LaVan & Neidenberg is ready to help. To learn if you are entitled to certain programs and benefits contact our veterans disability rights firm today – 1-888-234-5758.