WASHINGTON – To improve communications with veterans, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has told its field facilities to write decisions on applications for financial benefits with minimal jargon and legal citations.
"It is vital that veterans get good, quality decisions on their claims that they can understand," VA Under Secretary for Benefits Daniel L. Cooper told employees in a nationwide satellite telecast.
"Clarity and readability of claims decisions are as important as the accuracy of those decisions," Adm. Cooper said. "If the veterans cannot easily understand, then they will not be satisfied and they will believe that we are not serving them properly."
More than 90 percent of veterans or survivors accept VA's initial decisions for disability compensation, pension and other benefits. Where a veteran writes VA that he or she disagrees with a decision, VA then supplies a more lengthy explanation, called a "statement of the case." This statement may include legal references and citations to regulations.
Under a policy enacted last year, when VA receives a letter appealing a decision, officials automatically reconsider the case. An official not previously involved in the case provides a top-to-bottom review of the claim.
VA hopes that fewer claims will advance to an unnecessary appeal if VA explains clearly to veterans why an application for benefits did not meet legal requirements. For example, for disability compensation, generally there must be evidence to show that the veteran's serious chronic condition today can be associated in some way with the time the veteran was on active duty.
Thousands of pages of laws, VA regulations and court interpretations guide VA's regional offices in making decisions on claims. Medical judgments routinely are requested from physicians to determine the severity of a condition, and a VA claims representative must evaluate how the medical findings, records and other evidence mesh with the regulatory schedule used for disability ratings.
VA makes such rating decisions in about 700,000 applications a year. With veterans typically claiming two or more medical problems in each filing, VA claims representatives will decide more than 1.5 million issues affecting veterans' incomes this year.
Under the new policy on clarity, field offices will summarize the facts pertinent to a decision and explain clearly how they evaluated the information provided by the veteran.
In addition to providing reasons for the decision and a summary of the relevant evidence, VA field officials provide veterans with information about a right to a hearing and to representation. They also explain the procedure for obtaining a review of the decision so that the veteran may make a well-informed choice about whether to appeal.
If the VA's evaluation of a condition results in less than the maximum payment rate for a disability or has an effective date for payments that is less than full retroactivity to the date of separation from service, VA will explain what the veteran would need to get the next highest rating or an earlier effective date for payment.
