#Middlebury #Veterans #Claims #Dependents
VETERANS POST
By Freddy Groves
The problem was worse than we thought. It wasn’t only 32,000 veteran uploads to VA.gov that were caught in a “dead zone” glitch since 2018 with claims left unprocessed.
It was an additional 57,000 since 2011. This newly revealed problem concerned 56,000 veterans who needed to update the number of their dependents, and the problem was first unearthed in 2021.
Consider that problem: Whether a veteran is adding or subtracting a dependent, it changes the monthly disability benefit amount. Yes, those veterans who tried to add one or more dependents will get that backdated money eventually. But what of a veteran who tried to do the right thing and subtract a dependent? Will the Department of Veterans Affairs want that money back?
An additional nearly 1,000 glitches concerned veterans who tried to appeal a decision about their disability benefits. Apparently, when they tried to get the notice of disagreement online, nothing happened.
And now the VA is taking a close look at the whole system. They’re doing what they call a “full review” to make sure everything is working correctly. Part of this will be to watch the system carefully.
Which begs the obvious question: Why are they just now realizing that a computer system needs to be watched? The VA holds the lives of thousands of veterans (and their families) in their hands. It’s infuriating to think that so many errors were allowed to happen over so many years and that no one stopped to consider that maybe they needed to investigate, or add software to monitor things, or pay attention to the phone calls from veterans when expected additional benefit money did not appear, or notice when there were changes in how veterans seemed to be using (or not using) the online functions.
Meanwhile, on the VA.gov website, the information for changing the number of dependents has this: “Question … Can I file by mail? Answer … Yes, but we encourage you to file online.” But can the online process be trusted?
© 2023 King Features Synd., Inc.
