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Veterans whose service-connected disabilities are rated at 30 percent or more are entitled to additional allowances for dependents.

Depending upon the disability rating of the veteran, monthly allowances for a spouse range from $40 to $135 and for a dependent child, $27 to $91. Additional amounts are provided for each additional child and there is a higher scale for children in school after age 18. Adjustments to rates are based on a number of factors in addition to dependants.

Among factors that can have a significant effect on amounts are:

• Veterans with severe service-connected disabilities may receive compensation at a basic rate as high as $6,845 per month. Various special monthly compensation rates apply when a veteran experiences loss or loss of use of one or more limbs; loses one or more of the senses of sight, hearing or speech; or experiences loss of a reproductive organ or its use, or loss of breast tissue by a female veteran.
• Allowances may be made for veterans requiring aides, such as bedridden individuals who need assistance with eating, bathing or certain other activities of daily living. This adjustment is referred to as “aid and attendance.”
• Veterans whose service-connected disability leaves them unable to maintain gainful employment may meet criteria for allowances at the 100 percent compensation rate under a benefit called “individual unemployability.” A veteran with a single service-connected disability may be eligible if the veteran’s disability is rated at 60 percent or more. A veteran with multiple disabilities may be eligible if the veteran has a combined rating of 70 percent or more and at least one of the disabilities is individually rated 40 percent or higher.

Facts About VA Disability Compensation:

• Disability compensation for veterans is not subject to federal or state income tax.
• Veterans are rated at increments of 10 percent reflecting degree of disability.
• The largest category of veterans on the compensation scale is at 10 percent disability ($112 per month), with 775,854 veterans at this rate at the beginning of fiscal year 2006 among the total 2.6 million veterans receiving disability compensation.
• Where a veteran has more than one disability, the percentages are not simply added together to produce a new rating. Instead, a formula described in federal regulations calculates the overall rating.
• A veteran may be rated at zero percent, meaning there is evidence of the service-connected condition, but it does not impair the veteran. This zero percent rating, though not compensation, can be beneficial, since it may raise the veteran’s priority in other VA programs such as health care eligibility.
• A veteran may have a number of disabilities individually evaluated as zero percent which produce 10 percent combined disability and entitle the veteran to disability compensation.
• Cost of living adjustments become effective December 1 each year and are reflected in the payment received by veterans on or about the first day of the new year. Whenever a payment falls on a holiday or weekend, as is the case with the January 1 payment each year, that month’s payment is issued the last prior business day.

To review current compensation rates: http://www.vba.va.gov/bln/21/Rates/

Posted on August 18th, 2007 by jill
Filed under: Compensation & Pension