Question:
I appealed my character of discharge to the BVA. The BCNR informed me of the upgrade but the BVA has not sent me anything to say the matter was closed. I did get notice from the VBA that the appeal was granted. I have claims that were filed but were not adjudicated because of the character of discharge. When I appealed, I included them on the NOD and Form 9 as issues that I was appealing but no SOC was ever issued. Can I ask the BVA to have the RO consider those claims and if denied, issue a SOC as it states in 38 CFR 19.9?
Jim's Reply:
I'm not sure I follow you? You say you appealed your discharge to the BVA but the BVA isn't the place where we appeal our less than honorable paper. In your case the place you appealed your discharge to was the Board For Correction of Naval Records. The VA doesn't have the authority to upgrade a bad discharge paper.
If your discharge appeal to BCNR was successful, then your VBA denial could be appealed through the BVA. I'll assume that's the path you've taken and that you're now waiting for the finalized determination of all your paperwork.
You'll have to be patient for a bit. The VBA and the BVA are so backed up in records keeping and issuing the proper results of claims and appeals I seriously wonder if they can ever catch up. The pandemic struck a very hard blow to your VA and it's going to take a long while to catch up.
I'll assume that your paperwork is delayed in the mess left by the COVID pandemic. You can assume it's going to take weeks or months for VA to sort it out. During the time you're waiting you can file all the things you mention and more.
I wouldn't ordinarily recommend that you do that but in our current state of processing of claims and appeals, you need to timely file and hope VA catches up.
Good luck.