Happy November 12th! Hopefully you all had a day off in honor of Veteran’s Day. If not, hopefully you get another day off soon instead.
Today seemed like a good day to talk about a Veteran-related topic, and I picked one you might have seen in the news recently. Why is it in the news right now? Because it’s a doozy!
It seems something has gone terribly wrong at the US Department of Veteran’s Affairs…again. This time, it’s that GI Bill payments are caught up in a “technical glitch” which means people using the GI Bill aren’t getting paid.
That’s no good.
I thought I’d dig into this a little more to shine a light on the issue. I’m not going to have any insight you couldn’t find yourself, unfortunately, but I’m going to try to put it all in a nice little package for you. If you have any additional information (especially if you have been affected by this!) please let us all know in the comments.
Housing Allowances under the Post 9/11 GI Bill
I haven’t really talked about the GI Bill yet, so here’s some quick information on what we are talking about today:
- With the Montgomery GI Bill, you can get college tuition paid for
- Under the Post 9/11 GI Bill, you can also get a housing allowance (exceptions apply) in addition to your tuition
- The housing allowance for the Post 9/11 GI Bill is the amount an E-5 with dependents would make if stationed where you are attending college
- There are some different rules for things like overseas universities and taking classes online
The housing allowance can be pretty substantial and would represent a large chunk of income for most people using the GI Bill. For instance, a student attending Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona would receive $1602/month. A student attending a foreign university would receive $1681/month. And a student attending George Washington University in Washington, DC would receive $2367/month.
It’s not chump change!
Reporting starts
In mid-September 2018, Stars and Stripes put out an article about how GI Bill students were being paid 2017 housing allowance rates due to not yet updating their systems to comply with the Forever GI Bill changes.
(This may not be the first article that was published, but it’s the first I found)
Fast forward to 5 October, Stars and Stripes puts out another article stating that some people aren’t receiving any housing allowance. Others are still getting less than they should be. This article sort of explains the issue – when the VA tried to update the system, it overwhelmed their IT. No ETA for a fix.
The VA Announcements
On 10 October, the VA put out a statement that Post 9/11 GI Bill students were experiencing longer-than-normal wait times to receive monthly housing payments. This announcement talked about how claims are taking longer than normal, but did not acknowledge that some people are receiving incorrect amounts.
BTW, you can find an ongoing update of announcements on the VA website GI Bill page.
On 16 October, the VA put out an announcement to the universities asking them to “ensure that GI Bill students are not penalized if the school has not received tuition and fee payments due them from VA.”
Cool, so tuition and fees payments are also late. But universities have money and can keep working, knowing the government will pay them eventually.
But what about the people who can’t pay their rent? And their landlords? That same day, they put out another announcement that housing payments were still delayed. They also said they “regret that these delays are occurring and the impact they may have on you and your family.”
Sigh.
On 25 October, the VA put out an announcement recognizing the financial hardship this could be causing people. It included this message, in case you need to reach out to someone about this:
If you are experiencing a financial hardship due to a delay in GI Bill payments, please contact the Education Call Center at 1-888-442-4551 between 7 a.m. – 6 p.m. Central Time, Monday-Friday or contact us through the GI Bill website.
That day they also put out an announcement for schools on the same topic, where they identified what the VA considers a financial hardship.
Examples of a financial hardship due to a delay in GI Bill payments include, but are not limited to:
a beneficiary is in danger of losing housing;
a beneficiary is in danger of having utilities turned off;
and/or a beneficiary is in danger of receiving collection notices from creditors.
Uh, yeah. I’d consider those hardships!!
No more VA announcements since then, at least not on their website…
Additional Information
According to this article on Military.com, the VA is enforcing mandatory overtime for GI Bill processors until 30 November. No word on what happens if it isn’t fixed by then.
The SIT-REP Act (somebody had fun naming that thing) would, apparently, help with situations like this in the future. The problem? It hasn’t passed.
And yeah. SIT-REP means Servicemembers Improved Transition through Reforms for Ensuring Progress Act. Seriously, military acronyms are a thing of beauty…or dismay. You can find more information about the Act here.
And if you just want to be pissed off at the story of your brothers- and sisters-in-arms being affected by this, here is some major media coverage on Veterans Day. According to that one, over 82,000 people are still being affected by this glitch that has been known for months. And the glitch was predicted well over a year ago!
What to do if the GI Bill Housing Payment glitch is affecting you
In case this is impacting you, here is the information the VA is putting out to get more information. Please remember I do not work for the VA. I have no insider information on this process and therefore cannot help you if you are impacted by this glitch. You must contact the VA for help.
As Our Education Call Center is also experiencing higher than normal wait times, you can avoid waiting on the phone for a payment status by calling 1-888-442-4551 and choosing Option 2 for an automated response. You can also check your eBenefits or vets.gov account for payment status. Once your payment is processed by VA, it will take a few more days to reach your banking institution.
They also recommended asking for help through Customer Assistance.
And this opinion piece on Military Times is the VFW’s recommendation for what to do (more of the same, but from someone else).
Yep, multiple times when my husband was in school he didn’t get his GI bill payments. Luckily we didn’t NEED them immediately but I can’t imagine what it would have been like if we did. Stressful even thinking about trying to support a family on such uncertainty.
That’s crazy!! Granted, every system is going to have occasional errors but this is way beyond that.