VA announces major improvements in benefits processing and delivery

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs today announced a dramatic reduction in processing times for both Veteran disability claims and pension and survivor benefits, which shows that the Trump Administration's year-long push to make VA work better for Veterans is paying off.

VA receives millions of claims from Veterans each year for disability benefits and continues to process them faster than ever while maintaining high accuracy rates. This means more Veterans are receiving the benefits they've earned through their service on a timely basis. For example:

• After processing a record of more than 3 million claims in fiscal year 2025, VA is on a similar pace in FY2026 and has processed more than 1.5 million claims halfway through FY2026.
• In FY2026, VA completed 1 million disability claims faster than ever and hit this milestone on Feb. 2, 2026.
• VA's claims-processing accuracy has increased to 94.02%, which is the highest 12-month accuracy rate in the last two years.
• The average number of days needed to complete a claim has fallen from 141.5 days to 80.7 days since the start of the second Trump Administration, a 43% decrease.

VA also receives hundreds of thousands of claims for Veterans Pension, Survivors Pension, and Dependency and Indemnity Compensation each year. DIC benefits are for the surviving spouses, the children, or the parents of a service member who died in the line of duty or through a service-related injury or illness.

During the second Trump Administration, VA has stepped up its levels of service to ensure Veterans and Survivors receive the benefits they deserve:

• In February, the backlog of Veterans waiting for VA benefits fell to less than 100,000 claims for the first time since 2020.
• VA has decreased the average time to complete an initial Veterans Pension claim from 170 days to 57 days, a 66% reduction. The average time to complete an initial Survivors Pension claim has dropped from 172 days to 73 days, a drop of more than 55%.
• VA has nearly eliminated initial Veterans Pension claims that are part of the VA disability claims backlog (older than 125 days), reducing this backlog from 3,514 claims to just 71 claims, a 98% reduction. The Survivors Pension backlog has decreased from 3,391 claims to 115 claims, a 96% reduction.
• The average time to complete DIC claims has dropped from 163 days to 73 days, a decline of more than 50%.
• The number of DIC claims in the VA disability backlog (older than 125 days) has dropped from 13,501 claims to 2,257, an 83% reduction.

Additionally, VA has cut the average time to complete burial claims from 70 days to 31 days, a reduction of more than 50%.

VA achieved these milestones through focused leadership, hard work and targeted use of overtime. About half of VBA's claims processors are Veterans, and their firsthand understanding of military service strengthens VA's ability to deliver benefits with both precision and compassion.

"Under the leadership of President Trump, VA is focused on delivering Veterans, families, caregivers and survivors all of the benefits they've earned as quickly as possible," said VA Secretary Doug Collins. "These tremendous improvements underscore that commitment."