Those new to the VA claims process may come to believe that the VA is “pro claimant” or will, without a doubt, provide every possible assistance to support your disability claim. This belief is a dangerous pitfall based upon Congressional mandates and case law which is often ignored by a bureaucracy that is understaffed, undertrained, and underpaid for the processing of disability claims. The Veterans Claims Assistance Act of 2000 (VCAA) reaffirmed that the VA benefits and disability claims process up to the Board of Veterans’ Appeals (BVA) process must be non-adversarial. See, 38 C.F.R. §§ 3.102, 3.103, 3.105, 20.700 […]

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Posted on Friday, June 22nd, 2012 and filed under Veterans Benefits.

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When your receive the initial decision from the VA you have one year to file a Notice of Disagreement (NOD). When you file your NOD you should request the Decision Review Officer (DRO) hearing. This “non-traditional” method of appeal allows a “de novo” review, meaning a “new review” of the claim. The traditional NOD appeal only allows review based upon additional evidence not already in the claims file and there will be no hearing via the traditional NOD review process. A September 2011 Government Accounting Office (GAO) report evaluated the NOD DRO review process and found that many veterans were […]

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Posted on Monday, June 18th, 2012 and filed under Veterans Benefits.

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