Reason 1
No current disability in the record
VA has to see a disability you have now, not only one you had in uniform.
You do not need a diagnosis in hand to file. VA must give you an exam or obtain a medical opinion,
at no cost to you, when the record has competent lay or medical evidence of a current diagnosed
disability or persistent or recurrent symptoms of disability, plus an in-service event or
qualifying presumptive service, and indicates the two may be related — or may be related to another
service-connected disability (38 CFR 3.159(c)(4)(i)(A) through (C)). Symptoms with no name on them yet
are enough to trigger VA's duty. File.
Gulf War and Southwest Asia service. If you served on active duty in the Southwest Asia theater of
operations, or in Afghanistan and certain other locations under 38 CFR 3.317(c), a qualifying chronic
disability — an undiagnosed illness, or a medically unexplained chronic multisymptom illness such as
chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia or a functional gastrointestinal disorder — can be presumed
service connected. It must be disabling to a degree of 10 percent or more, have existed 6 months or more
or come and go across a 6-month span, and not be attributable to any known clinical diagnosis
(38 CFR 3.317(a)(1), (a)(2), (a)(4)).
Timing: as of September 2026 that regulation requires the
disability to appear to a degree of 10 percent or more not later than December 31, 2026. VA has extended
this deadline before. Confirm the current date on eCFR, or ask an accredited representative, before you
treat it as a closed door.
More from VA on Gulf War illness.
- Fix: see a doctor and get the condition written into your medical records.
- Keep your own copies of test results, evaluations and treatment notes.
★ Symptoms with no name yet still count.
Reason 2
Nothing in the file shows it happened in service
VA needs evidence of an in-service event, injury or illness.
- Fix: request your service treatment records.
- Look for unit records, morning reports and duty logs.
- Submit detailed, consistent statements from yourself and from people who saw it — buddies,
Family. The form is VA Form 21-10210, Lay/Witness Statement
(va.gov/find-forms/about-form-21-10210).
Your own account goes on VA Form 21-4138, Statement in Support of Claim.
If you engaged in combat with the enemy: VA must accept satisfactory lay or other evidence that
the injury or disease was incurred or aggravated in combat, even with no official record, so long as it
is consistent with the circumstances, conditions or hardships of that service. VA can only rebut it with
clear and convincing evidence to the contrary (38 U.S.C. 1154(b); 38 CFR 3.304(d)). Understand the
limit: this covers what happened in service. It does not remove the need for a current disability,
and it does not remove the need for evidence linking that disability to service. See Reason 3.
Missing records are not your fault. VA has a duty to assist in obtaining federal records, and must
notify you if it cannot get them (38 CFR 3.159(c)). If your records burned, flooded or vanished, that is
VA's problem to work, not a reason for you to quit.
★ Say who saw it. Put it on 21-10210.
Reason 3
No medical link between the condition and service
A nexus — a medical opinion connecting the two — is required for a direct claim.
It is not required for every claim.
Presumptive conditions. If your condition is presumptive — Agent Orange, burn pits and other
PACT Act exposures, prisoner of war, or a chronic illness that appears within one year of discharge
— you do not have to prove service caused it. You have to meet the service requirement.
The PACT Act and your VA benefits.
Secondary conditions. A condition caused or worsened by a disability you are already service
connected for is service connected as secondary (38 CFR 3.310). It needs no in-service event of its own.
You do not have to buy an opinion in order to file. When the evidence on file is not enough to
decide, and the record shows a current disability plus an in-service event that may be related, VA must
provide an exam and obtain a medical opinion at no cost to you (38 CFR 3.159(c)(4)).
- Fix: a nexus letter from a qualified health care provider still helps. Ask for one that
explains how the condition relates to your service and points to the records it relied on.
★ Presumptive and secondary skip the nexus.
Reason 4
The medical evidence is too thin
Missing treatment records, test results or doctor's notes weaken a claim.
- Fix: submit everything — VA records, private doctors, clinics.
- Include imaging and lab work, not just the visit notes.
- If a provider has records you cannot get, tell VA who and where.
★ Send it all. Let VA sort it.
Reason 5
You missed the claim exam
VA calls it a VA claim exam, also known as a compensation and pension, or C&P, exam.
Not every claim gets one. VA's own words: "We'll ask you to have a claim exam only if we need more
information to decide your claim."
va.gov/disability/va-claim-exam.
Missing it is not an automatic denial across the board — but what happens depends on the
claim, and on one kind of claim it stops your check. Under 38 CFR 3.655(b), if you miss an exam without
good cause on an original claim for disability compensation, VA rates the claim on the evidence
already in the file. On any other original claim, including an original pension claim, on a
supplemental claim for a benefit previously denied, or on a claim for increase, the claim shall be
denied.
If you are already receiving compensation and you miss a scheduled reexamination without
good cause, VA issues a pretermination notice and gives you 60 days to respond or reschedule. If
you do not, payments are reduced or discontinued (38 CFR 3.655(c)). Answer that letter.
- Fix: go to the exam.
- If you cannot make it, reschedule as soon as you know, using the contact information on your exam
letter.
- Good cause — illness, hospitalization, homelessness, a death in the Family — gets it
rescheduled. Say so.
- Keep your address and phone number current with VA. Most missed exams start with a letter that went
to an old address.
★ Never ignore an exam letter.
Reason 6
The record does not show an ongoing disability
Symptoms that come and go, with long gaps and no treatment in between, leave a thin file.
Ongoing treatment records and a written symptom log are not VA requirements. I will not tell you
they are. But they are exactly the kind of evidence that documents a condition that flares and settles,
and a thin file is what this denial is made of.
- Fix: get treated, and let the treatment build a record.
- Write down bad days as they happen — date, what it stopped you doing, how long it lasted.
- Submit statements from people who see the pattern over time, on VA Form 21-10210. Your own
account goes on VA Form 21-4138.
★ A gap in the record reads as a gap in the condition.
Reason 7
What you say at the claim exam
The examiner's report goes to the person who rates your claim.
- Fix: be honest and consistent in everything you submit and everything you say.
- Read your own records and your own statements before you send them in.
- Make sure what you tell the examiner matches your medical history. If something in your records is
wrong or incomplete, say so plainly rather than working around it.
★ Honest and consistent, every time.
Reason 8
A condition that existed before service
This one is stated backwards almost everywhere you read it. The law leans your way, not
VA's.
If it was not written on your entrance exam, the law presumes you entered in sound condition. Only
conditions recorded in examination reports count as noted (38 CFR 3.304(b)). For wartime service, or
service on or after January 1, 1947, VA must then produce clear and unmistakable evidence both
that the condition existed before service and that service did not aggravate it (38 U.S.C. 1111;
38 CFR 3.304(b)). Peacetime service before 1947 runs under 38 U.S.C. 1132, which requires six months or
more of active service and a lesser standard to rebut. The presumption attaches only where you were
examined, accepted and enrolled — with no entrance examination of record, there is nothing to
presume from.
If your pre-service condition got worse during service, the law presumes service aggravated it.
VA can only rebut that with a specific finding that the increase was the natural progress of the disease
— and for wartime service of any era, and peacetime service after December 31, 1946, that finding
takes clear and unmistakable evidence, meaning obvious or manifest (38 U.S.C. 1153; 38 CFR 3.306(a) and
(b)). Denials happen when the record does not document the in-service increase in severity.
- Fix: produce medical evidence showing the condition got worse while you were in.
- Point to increased symptoms, more treatment, profiles, duty limitations during service.
- Get a nexus opinion that addresses aggravation, not just cause.
★ Clean entrance exam? The burden is VA's.
Reason 9
Not enough evidence on a secondary condition
The usual wording in the denial: no clear medical link between the service-connected
condition and the secondary one.
- A secondary claim usually needs medical records or a medical opinion showing the link.
- Fix: get a nexus opinion that states plainly how the new condition is caused or aggravated by
your service-connected disability.
- Include medical literature or research supporting the connection if you have it.
There is a second path most people never hear about. If your service-connected disability made a
non-service-connected condition worse, the amount of that worsening is compensable
(38 CFR 3.310(b)). You do not have to show it caused the condition outright. The catch is real, so plan
for it: you need medical evidence showing how bad the condition was before the aggravation
started, because VA pays only the increase above that baseline, minus any worsening due to natural
progress.
★ Caused by, or made worse by. Both count.
Reason 10
Incomplete or incorrect submission
Missing forms, missing signatures, or evidence VA asked for and never got.
You have one year, not thirty days. When VA requests evidence from you, you have one year
from the date of that request to submit it (38 CFR 3.159(b)(1)). VA may go ahead and decide the claim if
you have not responded within 30 days — but if you submit the requested evidence inside that
one-year window, VA must readjudicate the claim. If you think you blew a short deadline, you probably
did not.
Protect your filing date. File an Intent to File, VA Form 21-0966, first. You then have one
year to send in the complete application, and it counts as filed on the intent-to-file date. That is
money — it is where your back pay starts. Separately, if VA notifies you that a supplemental
claim was incomplete, you have only 60 days to complete it to keep that filing date. An
incomplete original application does not hold your date for a year. Do not let anyone tell you it does.
- Fix: answer every VA letter, and answer it in writing.
- Send exactly what was asked for. Keep a copy and a date.
- The disability compensation application is VA Form 21-526EZ
(va.gov/find-forms/about-form-21-526ez).
★ One year to respond. Answer anyway.
After a denial
Three ways to fight it, and the clock on each
Read the date on your decision letter. Everything below runs from that date.
Supplemental Claim — VA Form 20-0995. For new and relevant evidence. There is
no filing
deadline. But file it
within one year of your decision notice to keep the effective date of
your original claim. File later and your back pay starts from the date of the supplemental claim, not
the original claim (38 CFR 3.2500). Veterans lose years of retroactive benefits on this one rule. If
your denial was any of the ten reasons above, this is usually your move, because every one of them is an
evidence problem.
va.gov/decision-reviews/supplemental-claim
Higher-Level Review — VA Form 20-0996. Within
one year of the decision. A more senior
reviewer looks at the same evidence; you cannot add new evidence. Not available for a contested claim.
va.gov/decision-reviews/higher-level-review
Board Appeal — VA Form 10182. Within
one year of the decision — but only
60 days if yours is a contested claim. A Veterans Law Judge reviews it.
va.gov/decision-reviews/board-appeal
★ No deadline is not the same as no cost.
Help
You do not have to pay to file
Nobody needs a cut of your back pay to help you with a claim.
- An accredited Veterans Service Organization representative's services on your VA claim are
always free. Recognized organizations and their accredited representatives may not charge you a
fee.
- An accredited attorney or claims agent may charge a fee, but only after VA issues its
initial decision. A fee up to 20 percent of past-due benefits is presumed reasonable; a fee over
33 1/3 percent is presumed unreasonable (38 CFR 14.636).
- Find an accredited representative through VA:
va.gov/get-help-from-accredited-representative.
- Everything about disability claims, in VA's own words:
va.gov/disability.
★ Free help exists. Use it first.