Workers Leave The VA Amid Flood Of New Cases And Quota Demands
“NBC NEWS” By Melissa Chan
“Claims processors with the Department of Veterans Affairs say they have strained to keep up with a flood of new cases brought on by the PACT Act and an existing quota system that pits their livelihoods against the veterans they signed up to help as a growing number of the processors leave the job.
The PACT Act expanded benefits to millions of veterans exposed to toxic substances when it was enacted in August of last year. But that has stressed the VA workers tasked with moving cases along amid a backlog, mandatory overtime, inadequate training and quota demands, according to two former claims processors and four current processors who spoke to NBC News on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.
The processors were struggling to manage the workload even before the PACT Act, with more than 2,000 having resigned or retired since 2020. The number of departures has grown each year, data shows.
“The PACT Act came in like a bull,” one of the current processors said. “Morale is on the floor.”
“It’s like this flowchart that is like a thousand pages long, and you’re under so much strain,” said Nancy Gwinn, who processed claims for the VA’s Houston office for about six years. “If I review all this, then I won’t make my points, and I will be terminated.”
Gwinn, 63, a single mother to two teenagers, worried she would lose her job if she spent too much time on a case. She said it was easier and quicker to look for the first thing that would discredit a claim and close it out, rather than find ways to approve it.
“It stresses our own internal ethics,” said Gwinn, a Navy veteran, who retired in 2020 because of job stress and physical health issues. “It’s an untenable request to make on anybody.”
VA Loses Track Of 32,000 Veterans Disability Claims
FEDERAL TIMES By Leo Shane III
“In August, VA leaders announced they had found roughly 32,000 veterans’ disability claims delayed — some dating back years — due to technical flaws in the department’s VA.gov filing systems. Two weeks later, officials acknowledged 57,000 more similarly delayed cases involving veterans trying to add dependents to their accounts.
Earlier this month, in a letter to VA leadership, committee Chairman Mike Bost, R-Ill., lamented the problems as “just the latest in a string of electronic filing issues that continue to plague the department.”
Such problems include ongoing issues with the department’s 10-year, $16-billion effort to overhaul its electronic health records system, which has been delayed by technical issues for months.
VA officials at Tuesday’s hearings promised regular updates to the committee on their proposed fixes in the coming weeks. Rosendale said he expects to hold more hearings on the issue in the months ahead.”
Commenti