Veterans Affairs Services (or VAS) is not authorized by the VA

DAV FL Chapter 70 Webmaster (Joe Stephens) follow up: February 18, 2011

From: http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2010/11/vet-warning-re-vas.html

Sunday, November 28, 2010

WARNING TO VETERANS
regarding
Veterans Affairs Services (VAS)

UPDATED: Truth or Hoax-Email Warning About Veterans Affairs Services (VAS)

WARNING TO VETERANS
Forwarded by Kevin Secor, VSO Liaison, Office of the Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Editor's Note: (from waronterrornews) This information has been passed on to me through several veterans groups!
There is a great deal of concern that veterans might think this group is affliated with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

An organization called Veterans Affairs Services (VAS) is providing benefit and general information on VA and gathering personal information on veterans. This organization is not affiliated with VA in any way. http://www.vaservices.org/us/index.html

VAS may be gaining access to military personnel through their close resemblance to the VA name and seal.
Our Legal Counsel has requested that we coordinate with DoD to inform military installations, particularly mobilization sites, of this group and their lack of affiliation or endorsement by VA to provide any services.

In addition, GC (General Counsel) requests that if you have any examples of VAS acts that violate chapter 59 of Title 38 United States Code, such as VAS employees assisting veterans in the preparation and presentation of claims for benefits, please pass any additional information to Mr.Daugherty at the address below.

Michael G. Daugherty
Staff Attorney
Department of Veterans Affairs
Office of the General Counsel (022G2)
810 Vermont Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20420

DAV FL Chapter 70 Webmaster (Joe Stephens) follow up: February 18, 2011

from http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2010/12/truth-or-hoax-email-warning-about-veterans-affairs-services-vas.html

Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Truth or Hoax - Email Warning about Veterans Affairs Services (VAS)
On November 28, 2010 we published an "email' warning about Veterans Affairs Services (VAS).

An email that has been widely circulated among veterans groups, and the internet.

VA Watchdog Today later linked to our email warning at their Rumor Control site.
They had this advice regarding the email, and I quote:
"I can't find the origin but it almost appears to be an attempt at humor...something like Onion News."
"Ignore it."

I was content to let that be the end of the email.
Then late last night, a veteran contacted me regarding this same email.
We talked and I said there was some doubt surrounding this email.
I sent him the link to the VA Watchdog site.
He responded by saying that he had gotten a letter from VAS.
He thought it might be something I should look into.
Thanks to the folks at Coast Guard Retiree Council Northwest for clearing up the question of is it the truth or a hoax!

I did find the following:
VAS has not updated their site's home page since "Page last updated: 02-Aug-2004" and other pages at their site contain broken links.
The names are striking similar.
Veterans Affairs Services vs Department of Veterans Affairs (commonly referred to as the VA-Veterans Affairs)
After much digging around, I was able to uncover one gem that quite possibly has cleared this whole truth or hoax situation up.
Over at the Coast Guard Retiree Council Northwest website, they went a step further and verified the email directly with Mr. Secor.
For those who are not comfortable following links all over the place I copied the information below.
The response is posted here.
Here is what he had to say:
MCPOCG (Retired) Vince Patton contacted Mr. Secor directly, who stated he did not send out any such warning note.
Here’s his response to Vince’s inquiry:
“In 2006, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of the General Counsel (OGC) corresponded with Veterans Affairs Services (VAS) regarding concerns that the organization's name and seal created the impression that VAS was affiliated with, or endorsed by, the Department.
OGC advised the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) of these concerns and VBA circulated the information.
VAS later added a disclaimer at the top of its website home page that addressed some of our concerns.
No further action was taken.
Section 5902(a) of title 38, United States Code, authorizes VA to recognize organizations for the limited purpose of ensuring competent representation of Veterans seeking benefits.
Organizations like VAS may provide services to Veterans without VA recognition, including informational websites, if the services do not include assistance with the preparation, presentation, and prosecution of claims for VA benefits.
Since July 2006, OGC has had no communications with VAS and has not issued any advice regarding the organization.
The recent e-mail message warning Veterans about VAS' activities, which has been widely disseminated, is from an unknown source but contains some of the information discussed with VAS and VBA in 2006."

You will find the link to the above material here at Coast Guard Retiree Council Northwest under CG BENEFITS NEWS 2010 DEC 03 - VA "warning to veterans" was false alarm
I for one, don't find much humor in or feel one should "ignore it" when warnings tell you to refrain from giving out personal information. But that is just my opinion!

DAV FL Chapter 70 Webmaster (Joe Stephens) final followup comment
February 18, 2011

from http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2010/12/truth-or-hoax-email-warning-about-veterans-affairs-services-vas.html

vaservices@aol.com said...
To all that know me and know the truth about Veterans Affairs Services:
Please FORWARD this to all the people on your list that may have received the misrepresentation put out.
I'm sending this out to everybody that was on any mailing list that I received that got this.
Veterans Affairs Services

Response
Here is what I found out:
The memo that is being sent around the net was put up by someone at the VFW.
Its Been ALTERED and has been discredited! I’ve talked to the VFW and here is what they told me: “We took it down within 24 hours because it wasn’t true and it should not have been put up. When I asked them what they were going to do about this they said “We took it down that’s all.” And when I asked them if they had talked to Mr. Kevin Secor they said that they did and that he said he never put this out and doesn’t know how his name got on it. I asked them to put up a retraction….they said “no”. The VFW has refused to retract this or as I see it they have “left a wounded man on the battlefield” ….. What a group of people they have running things!

Therefore, I am going to give you the facts and I expect you to send this out to everybody you know.

The 2 guys at the VFW that refuse to send out a retraction are: Jerry Newberry: 816-756-3390 ext 168 jnewberry@vfw.org and Alan “Gunner” Kent 816-751-3390 ext110 akent@vfw.org. Ask them to give you proof of this memo and to give you Kevin’s number to ask him directly.

Please send this to the people at USDR, because it won’t die there either. Here is the e-mail for USDR: Legislative@USDR.ORG

Please send this out to any and all organizations that may be spreading That memo around:
To all the organizations that may have posted this to your web site, this will serve as your only warning, I will have my attorneys contact you if the retraction is not posted, please take down the memo, alert your members that it was a false and misleading posting and put this put this up on your site:

Here is the story of VA Services

For all the veterans that are sending this warning around without checking the validity of the facts.; here are the facts:
1) Veterans Affairs Services was started by me in 1993 as a nonprofit veteran’s service organization to teach the military what their benefits are, how to access them and why someone should stay in service.

2) I funded the program myself. I never took a dime of donations from anybody, well except for $25.00 from a retired general who insisted that we take it because he thought so much of our program. Other than that, I funded the program for 12 years to the tune of about 1.2 million dollars. I spent a lot of time and money going to Congress, all the Services, the Joint Chiefs, and I spent a lot of time with the sub-committee on Military Personnel and Readiness, chaired by the now Secretary of The Army, The honorable John McHugh, all to discuss the benefits due our service members.

3) I engaged those at the Pentagon that had the belief that the troops didn’t need to know what their benefits were until they got out of service, and even then they didn’t think they needed all the information at one time. These individuals would tell me that if the troops knew what their benefits were that they would leave the service. My argument was just the opposite, that an informed troop is a better troop that will stay in.

4) We would teach our VAS class in the time allotted by the command usually in about an hour and a half. We have had guys that had gone to the TAP (Transition Assistant Program) Class and then attended our class say they learned more in our hour class then they did in a three day work shop in the TAP class.

5) When we started this program the attrition rate was huge. Our program represented a savings to the US government of hundreds of millions of dollars a year. That savings was achieved based on the simple fact that the Army trained a soldier for a particular MOS spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to train him or her and in three or four years they would leave the service. We had the novel idea that we should explain to the troops what their benefits were, how to access them and why they should stay in service or move to the Guard or Reserve.

6) The VA supplied all of my paperwork and anything that I needed. There were people in the VA that I would engage with over how I thought they were out of touch with what the troops thought and how VA did things.

7) Two people at the VA got upset when I went to Congress and the Veterans Committee to change the way they were doing things… As you can guess, that didn’t go over well.

And that now brings me to this memo. It was an internal memo that was leaked back in 2003. It was an internal inquiry memo, nothing more. If you read the memo it asks for examples of anything VAS did wrong. When I talked to Daugherty he said" Don’t worry about it. It’s internal and it’s just an inquiry. There have been no complaints." Also did you notice that is no date or routing number on the memo? It has been altered and Kevin Secor's name has been added to it.

In the meantime, the two people that I upset in the VA went to the inspector general and got him to open an investigation. They opened an investigation into VAS in 2003, they investigated me and VAS for 4 and a half years and they found NOTHING that we did wrong. They interviewed everybody they could, to include 1,2 and 3 star generals that let us teach the course to their troops and it was implied that we had given these officers something in return. They of course found that nothing like that ever happened. They came up with nothing.

VAS was totally exonerated! I spent around $600,000 of my own money fighting this attack on my reputation and I closed down VAS in 2005.

So let me say this to all of you that so blindly send out anything you see on the net without checking it out and doing your homework; VAS has been closed for 5 years and VAS never did anything wrong. If it can happen to me it can happen to you……Remember this: When you deal with the military or the VA…no good deed goes unpunished!

Thank You and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

And May God Bless our Troops and these United States of America

Michael Foster
National Director (Ret)
Veterans Affairs Services
m.foster@vaservices.org

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