Since 12-15-05
High error rate for VA claims riles vets’ groups
Since 12-15-05
From: Waspscpo@aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2005 6:16 AM
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Subject: High error rate for VA claims riles vets’ groups
High error rate for VA claims riles vets’ groups
By Rick Maze
Air Force Times staff writer
19 December 2005
Veterans’ organizations are decrying the fact that the error rate on disability
claims remains high even as the backlog of claims continues to grow at the
Department of Veterans Affairs.
About 15 percent of initial benefits decisions on claims from veterans and
survivors include errors, the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee was told Dec. 7,
while the backlog of claims has increased to 346,000, almost 8 percent higher
than last year.
The average time to process a claim is 120 days, and processing an appeal takes
an average of 622 days, the Government Accountability Office said.
Ronald Aument, VA’s deputy undersecretary for benefits,
said the workload has increased every year since 2000, with 788,298 claims filed
in fiscal 2005, a 36 percent increase over that span.
“It is expected that these increases will continue over the next five years,” he
said.
“Given the increase in volume and complexity of the workload, we have remained vigilant about the quality of the claims processing results,” Aument said.
Quentin Kinderman of the
Veterans of Foreign Wars said the VA does not seem to have an overall plan to
cut the error rate.
“For a claims process that profoundly affects the lives of veteran claimants,”
Kinderman said, “15 percent is a very high error rate.”
Given the current staffing levels of the Veterans Benefits Administration, which
handles claims, Kinderman said the error rate “suggests that every VA
decision-maker makes a significant error approximately every other day.”
“Veterans and their survivors, after waiting many months or even years for a
decision from the VA, may receive a decision that is significantly flawed,” he
said.
The high error rate is becoming well known and is creating its own problems,
said Brian Lawrence of Disabled American Veterans.
“The VA’s reputation for carelessness results in appeals even in cases that are
error-free,” he said. “The scuttlebutt among many veterans is that every VA
decision should be questioned just to ensure nothing has been overlooked.”
That results in an even bigger backlog of claims because VA must process the
appeals.
Veterans’ advocates say VA is caught in a Catch-22 in which efforts to whittle
the backlog of claims by increasing the speed at which decisions are made plays
a role in the high error rate.
“Regional office managers are pressing ratings employees to process numbers
without ensuring claims decisions are done right the first time,” said Blake
Ortner of Paralyzed Veterans of America.
Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., chairman of the committee, acknowledged a need to
increase VA staffing to address the problems and promised to work with other
committee members, the White House and veterans’ groups to find “a viable
solution.”
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Contributed,
YNCS Don Harribine, USN(ret)