To be sure, last week was a big one for breaking national news, so you may have missed a substantial development with VA’s claim process, and the backlog of claims that have way too many folks waiting for a decision.

From VA’s Under Secretary for Benefits Allison Hickey, on Friday:

Effective today, every regional office will begin implementing an initiativeto ensure that those who have been waiting a year or more for their compensation claim receive a decision quickly. VA raters will make provisional decisions on the oldest claims in inventory, which will allow Veterans to begin collecting compensation benefits more quickly, if eligible.

In other words, this move makes a clear decision: get compensation to Veterans quickly while their claim is being evaluated.

As the Army Times noted, about a quarter of the million claims out of 570,000 are over a year old, and assigning priority will increase the backlog for a time before the toughest cases get out of the door—and compensation into the hands of Vets.

An initiative to get claims pushed through faster—Fully Developed Claims—will continue to receive priority processing, so if you haven’t filed yet, check out that link to get your claim decided faster.

Original Source:http://www.blogs.va.gov/VAntage/9225/provisional-decision-coming-to-older-disability-claims/