After several reports on
the horrendous customer service of the Department
of Veterans Affairs toward veterans in 2014, the VA is now celebrating some
“good news” on that front for 2015: VA officials have settled on a single map
of the United States.
Pop the Champagne for
bureaucratic progress!
It
should be noted, the Department currently uses at least nine maps of the US,
which divides the country into dozens of regional networks and administrative
duties for its hundreds of programs.
Later
this year, all VA agencies will be on the same page, looking at the same map,
coordinating efforts along the newly drawn five regions to allow veterans a
single point of entry for a host of office offerings.
However,
VA officials skimmed past specific details on what they called "the
biggest organizational change in VA history," but said the work will not
immediately mean cuts to the 340,000-plus workforce.
The
new VA Secretary, Bob McDonald, has touted the MyVA program
as an overall push to improve customer service toward veterans by trimming
layers of bureaucratic waste and duplication, which has caused many a veteran
headaches.
To its
credit, the program has improved signage at hospitals and given more
independent authority to call center operators on veterans benefits issues. The
map change, officials said, could potentially improve communication and
coordination between offices that previously had little interaction, creating
more one-stop shops for veterans.
But
don’t hold your breath quite yet, as details on exactly how this change will
all play out won’t be decided for months. (Agreeing on one map was hard
enough.)
The
Regional Offices, which oversee benefits processing, home loan awards, and
health care services, among other items, will each have to decide how to
realign their operations in light of the new map.
On a
briefing call earlier this week, VA officials said the map announcement was intended
to provide an update on the overall MyVA simplification efforts and to reassure
veterans that work is taking place.
Secretary
McDonald said in a statement that this is the "first step in empowering
veterans to interact with one VA" and a way to "improve the veteran
experience by enabling veterans to more easily ... access their earned care and
benefits."
VA
expects to have plans in place to ensure their structures are aligned within
the new map by the end of June.
Read
more on this story in the Military Times:
No comments:
Post a Comment