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VA Memo Ordered ‘Cooking The Books’ In Philadelphia Office
Image for representational purposes only.
The Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) uncovered a memorandum enabling its Philadelphia office to ‘cook the books,’ giving the appearance of fewer claims backlogged when there really weren’t.
Called “Fast Letter 13-10” within the VA, it was issued in May 2013. The memo, according to The Washington Times, “ordered workers to put the current date on benefits claims that were sometimes more than a year old, thereby ‘eliminating’ part of the highly publicized backlog with the stroke of a pen or timestamp.”
The OIG’s office conducted an investigation which started last June and issued a report Wednesday condemning the memo.
“By design, the guidance contained in Fast Letter 13-10 was flawed, as it required [Philadelphia] staff to adjust the dates of claims for unadjudicated claims found in claims folder to reflect a current date,” the report said. “As such, the reliability of all performance measures related to [agency] timeliness measures for processing claims becomes unreliable.”
We substantiated allegations involving data integrity concluding that Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) guidance for adjusting dates of claims for unadjudicated claims had been misapplied.
Ultimately, processing actions led to introducing information into veterans’ claims that misrepresented the actual time a veteran waited for his or her claim to be processed.
Further, this VARO (Veterans Affairs Regional Office) lost the ability to determine to what extent VARO staff adjusted dates of claims and it lacked an audit trail to help identify claims that were adjusted.
The Under Secretary for Benefits (USB) responded by ultimately terminating the use of VBA’s guidance, identified as Fast Letter 13-10, after we brought the issue to her attention.
USA Today pointed out that the Philadelphia office processes more than $4 billion in veteran pension benefits every year. The publication also noted in the OIG’s report that 68 boxes of claims were waiting to be scanned into the VA’s electronic system, along with 37 boxes of almost 15,000 pieces of mail.
100 boxes with 22,000 pieces of mail dating back three to five years were also found.
Share this if you want the VA to be held accountable.
This post originally appeared on Western Journalism – Equipping You With The Truth
Source: http://www.westernjournalism.com/va-memo-ordered-cooking-the-books-in-philadelphia-office/
