If you have applied for veterans disability benefits only to have your claim denied you have the right to appeal. At this stage you must understand how a disability claim attorney differs from a VA service officer.
When can you rely on advice from a veterans service officer?
Veterans service officers are direct employees of the DVA, Amvets or the American Legion. They can be very helpful when you are first contemplating claiming for disability benefits. These people can provide guidance on how to complete the forms, how to gather the evidence that the VA will demand and answer your questions. There is no denying that these people provide an excellent service when making your initial claim for disability benefits. If your claim is not approved, then you must turn to a VA disability claim attorney.
How can a VA disability claim attorney help?
A veterans service officer can help prepare the initial claim for disability benefits, a VA disability claim attorney is someone that can help with the confusing and time consuming appeals process should your claim be denied. These attorneys are accredited by the DVA, to keep this accreditation they are obliged to keep up to date with all rule and law changes. Although an attorney cannot speed up the appeals process once it gets back to the DVA, they can compress the time that it takes to gather supporting evidence and completing the appeals paperwork. An attorney can arrange to have medical experts testify on your behalf, for those that lack evidence to support the claim, this can be the difference between winning and losing a claim.
Both the VSO and a VA disability claim attorney provide extremely valuable service to disabled veterans, it is important to understand their unique roles, to know what they can do and what they can’t.