Veterans experience delays in GI Bill payments

[sabra]

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/news/politics/13871609.htm

Veterans experience delays in GI Bill payments

Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - A surge in veterans using the GI Bill to pay for college is increasing delays for students in getting their money from the Department of Veterans Affairs.

For students attending colleges in the central United States, it's been taking nearly eight weeks on average for a first-time applicant to start receiving VA college funds. That's more than twice as long as it's supposed to take, according to the VA's standards.

"For some of these VA guys, that's all they live on when they're in school," said Rowdy Pyle, financial aid counselor at Ozarks Technical Community College in Springfield, Mo., where about 30 students have raised concerns about delays. "They're getting a little worried when they hear they may not get their check until sometime in March."

This week the VA began taking what it called "extraordinary measures" to reduce the backlog at its St. Louis claims-processing center, including diverting all incoming calls to an office in Oklahoma for two weeks to free up 20 employees to process claims. St. Louis is the slowest of the VA's four education claims-processing centers.

[DS1]

1. I've dealt with this personally

One year, when classes started in the very beginning of September, I got my first payment in January. It was a big payment because of all the backed up months, but that didn't mean anything because I was so friggin broke at that point.

[saigon68]

2. Its just a big "FUCK YOU" to the Veteran

[Earth_First]

3. I remember dealing with this...

They are correct, sometimes the pay is sent to you retroactively many months later, sometimes you are overpaid, involving a headache of a time to properly balance the bank while dealing with living expenses and contacting those responsible to return an overpayment. Including this with my other experiences in the military, I cannot express to you how relieved I am to have my DD-214.