H.R. 4038 — Introduced in House

I 113th CONGRESS 2d Session H. R. 4038 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES February 11, 2014 Mr. Flores introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs A BILL To direct the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to make certain improvements in the information technology of the Veterans Benefits Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs to process claims more efficiently, and for other purposes. 1. Short title This Act may be cited as the Veterans Benefits Administration Information Technology Improvement Act of 2014. 2. Improvement of information technology of the Veterans Benefits Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs (a) Processing of certain educational assistance claims The Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall, to the maximum extent possible, make such changes and improvements to the information technology system of the Veterans Benefits Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs to ensure that— (1) to the maximum extent possible, all original and supplemental claims for educational assistance under chapter 33 of title 38, United States Code, are adjudicated electronically; and (2) rules-based processing is used to make decisions with respect to such claims with little human intervention. (b) Vocational rehabilitation claims The Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall reduce redundancy and inefficiencies in the use of information technology to process claims for rehabilitation programs under chapter 31 of title 38, United States Code, by— (1) ensuring that payments of subsistence allowance for veterans participating in a rehabilitation program under such chapter are only processed and paid out of one corporate information technology system, in order to eliminate the redundancy of multiple information technology payment systems; and (2) enhancing the information technology system supporting veterans participating in such a program to support more accurate accounting of services and outcomes for such veterans. (c) Report Not later than 180 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall submit to Congress a report on the changes made pursuant to the requirements os subsections (a) and (b).