This is the first post in a series of posts: “5 Reasons the VA is screwing up your claim and how you have the power to fix it.”
Reason #1: There is too much “paper” in your C-File.
When I first arrived at Ft. Hood, Texas, as a 1st Lieutenant, I took over an MLRS platoon. These were the rocket launchers that could send munitions thousands of miles down range with frightening (for the enemy) pinpoint accuracy..
I sat down with each of the NCOs in the platoon, to get a feel for what my new team was like.
One NCO talked – incessantly – about how the Platoon’s Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) needed rewriting. I told him to bring his thoughts to me and we’d build a new SOP.
The next day, he brought me the old SOP – and he was right. It was binders of paper loaded with overly verbose nonsense that had little to do with artillery tactics or unit procedures.
But this NCO made no effort to tell me what he wanted or needed in the new SOP. He just dumped it in my lap.
It took me a month to sift through all the paper he gave me and did my best to put together a new and streamlined SOP.
When I gave the new SOP to the NCO, he was annoyed. “Sir” he said, “These aren’t what we want or need.”
I didn’t miss a beat in my response.
“Then next time, don’t dump binders of paper in my lap and leave it to me to figure it all out — tell me what you want and need.”
Do you do that in your VA clam?
Do you throw volumes of paper at the VA? Stacks of medical records and military records for them to sort through?
Do you give them a haystack, and then yell and scream at them when they can’t find the needle?
When you don’t know what to send, do you send a duplicate copy of every page you sent the last time, thinking THIS time, the VA will read and understand.
What do you think happens to that paper?
If you’re lucky, they lose it. Seriously. The last thing you want is a ticked off bureaucrat writing a formal Ratings Decision that will affect your fate for years – decades – to come.
You might get a better and more satisfying outcome – and possibly a faster one – by taking the time to see your case from the VA’s perspective.
Then, send only what they need to decide your claim.
How do you figure that out? That is what this entire blog is and has been about.
For example, if you read my 8 Steps to improving your VA Claim, you will see that they are designed to help you figure out, for yourself, what the VA does and does not need to grant your claim.
Many veterans who have come before you have used those 8 steps to prove, and win, their claim. This is one of my favorite success stories:
“Thanks for the great information. I would like to share with your followers; I subscribed to VLB in the summer of 2016 and at the time had just received a 40% rating for TBI with a combined 50%. Capitalizing on the information in VLB, I was awarded 90% with effective date of Nov 2015 and 100% with effective date of Sep 2017. The “small” investment made with VLB was well worth it. Thank you very much Chris, I wouldn’t have been able to achieve this without your VLB Material.”
– Johnny P.
He’s not the only person. Here’s another story of another veteran who used the process on the Veterans Law Blog® to change his VA claim – and his life – forever.
Don’t get me wrong: those 8 steps aren’t easy.
I’m a lawyer, and at times I am overwhelmed by the complexity of the VA claims process.
And for that reason I’ve created video training courses to teach you in much greater detail what I have learned about the VA claims and appeals process. These two videos remain two of the most popular training courses on the Veterans Law Blog®:
* The VA C-File – How to Get It, and How to Use It. (Click here to learn more)
* How to Prove Service Connection in a VA Disability Compensation Claim. (Click here to learn more).
With a commitment to learning what it takes to prove your claim, and taking ownership of proving your own VA claim, you can eliminate the primary reason the VA is screwing up your claim: there’s too much paper and they just don’t care enough to sort through it.
