(soft music)
- Hi there, Matthew Hill here with Carol Ponton
from Hill and Ponton,
and we're here to talk today
about getting 100% service connection
for VA benefits.
We get clients asking us all the time
what's in it for them,
why get to 100,
and why is it so hard to get to 100%?
First of all, there's two ways
to get to 100%.
The first way is to have either one rating
or combined ratings that equal 100%.
And as we've seen in our vet scene,
the VA doesn't do one plus two
equals three math.
They've got a strange way of combining things.
And the closer you get to 100%,
the harder it is to get 100%.
There's a whole chart, combination chart,
in the VA regulations that we won't get into,
but suffice it to say that it's really,
really hard to get a combined rating of 100%.
- Well I think that the best way to explain
it is if the VA finds you 40% disabled,
then they figure you only have
60% of your body left.
So the next time they give disability,
it's, say it's 20%, instead of adding 20
with 40, they go well it's 20%
of the 60% left,
which is 12%,
which gives you 52%, not 60.
As you can see, each time it gets harder
and harder to get to 100,
and that's why they have the other way
to get 100% which is called
total disability due to un-employability.
- Or un-employability or IU.
- Right, and that's for people that aren't working
and that they have a combination
of disabilities that would equal 70%.
They have to have on that equals
at least 40 out of that,
and a lot of times it's much easier
for a veteran to get 100%
through the un-employability
rating procedure as opposed
to a scheduler 100%
- And it's important to understand
that the VA regulations
for compensation are based
around how much of a diminished capacity
does the veteran have from working.
So looking at the veteran's service
connected disabilities, how much do they
prohibit the veteran from working?
What kind of impairment is that?
So in theory, someone getting 100% anyway
would be completely unable to work.
That's not true.
You can get 100% ratings
that aren't where the veteran cannot work,
but the beauty of un-employability is
even if you can't get your ratings
to combine together to 100%,
if you can show that due to those disabilities
you can no longer work,
then the VA has to compensate you at 100%.
- Right, and it's amazing the difference.
Say you've been being paid at the rate of 90%.
That's $1,689 as opposed to 100%,
which is $2,800 more.
So just in the monetary value alone,
that's a significant improvement.
But the thing that people don't realize
is 100% gives you incredible benefits.
It's as if you retired from the VA, you'd get--
- From the military.
You can get a card that allows you
to go on base to use all the services on base,
including the commissary, the PX.
You get everything covered by the VA
as far as any medical problems.
You get glasses covered,
your dental covered,
any problem physically you have
or mentally, whether it's service connected
or not, is covered fully by the VA.
There are no more co-pays.
The other thing you get is if you're married,
your spouse is entitled to medical coverage.
A lot of the states have incredible benefits
for 100% disabled veterans.
- Now the one caveat is that it's 100% permanent total.
If you have a temporary 100%
or you have 100% that's to be reviewed,
then you do not get most
of these secondary benefits.
- Right, but the permanent total, 100%.
You're gonna get,
in many states,
you don't have to pay any property tax,
which is significant.
You don't have to pay for a driver's license,
you don't have to pay for your license plate,
you don't have to pay for a fishing license.
There are incredible benefits
that not only the government,
but many states, have enacted.
I know if you go into a national park
if you're a disabled veteran, it's free.
- You don't pay, yeah.
- And the other thing that a lot
of people don't realize is
when a veteran dies,
if they have been 100% disabled
by the VA for 10 years,
then their spouse is automatically
entitled to the benefit.
Otherwise, their spouse may get nothing.
- Right, the spouse can always apply
when the veteran dies
for what's called DIC benefits,
which is a monthly pension.
But typically you have to show
that the veteran died of a service connected disability,
it was either the direct cause
or contributing cause of death,
but what Carol's saying is
if the veteran's permanent total 100% for 10 years,
- Or more.
- Or more, then it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter what he died of.
The VA will have to pay the widow
compensation, and that's typically
very comforting in veteran's minds
in that their spouse will be left
with something when they pass.
- Right, and you know our firm
also does social security,
and often, for some reason,
the veterans feel they're not entitled to both.
But you can get social security disability,
the full benefit, as well as 100% VA benefits.
And both of those combined together,
you're probably not even gonna be
paying taxes on those.
That's the other thing.
Remember all the benefits you get
from the VA are tax free.
But you know, there's so many benefits
that I forget all the ones
that are available.
- And Carol just brought up a really good point
about social security.
If you're someone, you're a veteran,
you're on social security disability
and it's due to a service connected disability,
so say you have PTSD rated at 70%,
you go into the social security hearing
and they grant you social security disability,
it's based on that PTSD,
that's a really good hint
that you are being undercompensated
by the VA.
If you're on social security disability
due to a VA disability,
you need to be either at 100% for VA
or at un-employability.
And again, with the difference in benefits,
social security, you know,
it's a gracious benefit,
but it's around what, $1,200 a month?
- Well, it depends on your earnings,
but I think the most is $2,400-2,500 a month.
I mean, that is the very max.
- And that's somebody that's making
hundreds of thousands of dollars a year,
whereas again, VA, you're at $2,800
just for a single person.
You know, that's a 2012 compensation table,
but you know, it's there and a lot
of vets don't realize it.
As Carol said, 90% is not 90%
of the full 100% payment.
It's VA math again.
So it's important both for you
and your family to maximize
your compensation.
So the way I think of it is
the overall architecture of the VA system
is the more diminished your capacity is to work,
the less you can work,
the higher your rating should be.
So if you're all the way at the point
where you're not working
or you're working and making less
than $1,000 a month,
you should be getting 100%
due to your ratings being combined
or through un-employability.
- Right.
- So we will talk to you again soon,
but remember 100% is when
you're not working,
and there's tons of auxiliary secondary
benefits for that.