[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 180 (Tuesday, November 12, 2019)]
[House]
[Pages H8755-H8757]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
VA OVERPAYMENT ACCOUNTABILITY ACT
Mr. TAKANO. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the
bill (H.R. 4360) to amend title 38, United States Code, to improve the
due process accorded veterans with respect to recovery of overpayments
made by the Department and other amounts owed by veterans to the United
States, to improve the processing of veterans benefits by the
Department of Veterans Affairs, and for other purposes.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the bill is as follows:
H.R. 4360
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``VA Overpayment
Accountability Act''.
SEC. 2. REPAIR OF CREDIT.
(a) In General.--Chapter 53 of title 38, United States
Code, is amended by adding at the end the following new
section:
``Sec. 5320. Correction of erroneous information submitted to
consumer reporting agencies
``(a) Correcting Errors by the Department.--In any case in
which the Secretary finds that the Department has submitted
erroneous information to a consumer reporting agency about
the indebtedness of any person who has been determined by the
Secretary to be indebted to the United States by virtue of
the participation of that person in a benefits program
administered by the Secretary, the Secretary shall--
``(1) instruct the consumer reporting agency to remove such
erroneous information from the consumer report of such person
or take such other action as may be required to ensure that
such erroneous information is not included in the report of
such person; and
``(2) transmit to the consumer reporting agency such
information as the consumer reporting agency may require to
take such appropriate actions.
``(b) Correcting Errors by Debt Collectors.--In any case in
which the Secretary finds that a debt collector acting on
behalf of the Department has submitted erroneous information
to a consumer reporting agency about the indebtedness of any
person who has been determined by the Secretary to be
indebted to the United States by virtue of the participation
of that person in a benefits program administered by the
Secretary, the Secretary shall instruct the debt collector to
request the consumer reporting agency remove such erroneous
information from the consumer report of such person or take
such other action as may be required to ensure such erroneous
information is not included in the report of such person.
``(c) Notice.--Not later than 60 days after the date on
which the Secretary issues an instruction under subsection
(a)(1) or (b) with respect to a person, the Secretary shall
notify the person that the Secretary issued such instruction.
``(d) Definitions.--In this section:
``(1) The terms `consumer report' and `consumer reporting
agency' have the meanings given such terms in section 603 of
the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681a).
``(2) The term `debt collector' has the meaning given such
term in section 803 of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act
(15 U.S.C. 1692a).''.
(b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of sections at the
beginning of chapter 53 of such title is amended by adding at
the end the following new item:
``5320. Correction of erroneous information submitted to consumer
reporting agencies.''.
(c) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section
shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act
and shall apply with respect to deductions made under section
5314 of such title, administrative costs under section 5315
of such title, and suits filed under section 5316 of such
title on or after such date.
SEC. 3. IMPROVED PROCESSING OF BENEFITS BY DEPARTMENT OF
VETERANS AFFAIRS.
The Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall improve the
information technology of the Department of Veterans Affairs
(including the eBenefits system or successor system) as may
be necessary to achieve the following:
(1) Notification of debts incurred.--The Secretary shall
provide a notification to a person who--
(A) is entitled to a payment from the Secretary under a
benefits program administered by the Secretary;
(B) incurs a debt to the United States under that benefits
program; and
(C) elects to receive such notifications.
(2) Review of information regarding dependents.--A person
entitled to a payment from the Secretary under a benefits
program administered by the Secretary may review information
relating to dependents of that person.
(3) Tracking metrics.--The Secretary shall be able to
track--
(A) the number and amount of payments made by the Secretary
to a person entitled to a payment from the Secretary under a
benefits program administered by the Secretary who incurs a
debt to the United States under such program;
(B) the average debt to the United States incurred by a
person described in subparagraph (A);
(C) how frequently the Secretary approves and denies
applications for relief under section 5302(a) of title 38,
United States Code; and
(D) such other metrics the Secretary determines
appropriate.
SEC. 4. AUDIT OF ERRONEOUS PAYMENTS BY VETERANS BENEFITS
ADMINISTRATION; PLAN OF CORRECTION.
(a) Audit.--Not later than 180 days after the date of the
enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs
shall complete an audit to determine the following:
(1) The frequency by which the Department of Veterans
Affairs makes an error that results in a payment to a person
by virtue of such person's participation in a benefits
program administered by the Secretary that such person is not
entitled to or in an amount that exceeds the amount to which
the person is entitled.
(2) Whether and to what degree vacant positions in the
Veterans Benefits Administration affect such frequency.
(b) Plan.--Not later than 30 days after the completion of
the audit under subsection (a), the Secretary of Veterans
Affairs shall submit to the Committees on Veterans' Affairs
of the Senate and House of Representatives a plan and
description of resources necessary to align information
technology systems to ensure that errors described in
subsection (a)(1) are not the result of communication or
absence of communication between information technology
systems.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
California (Mr. Takano) and the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. David P.
Roe) each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California.
General Leave
Mr. TAKANO. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks
and to insert extraneous material on H.R. 4360.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from California?
There was no objection.
Mr. TAKANO. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 4360, the VA Overpayment
Accountability Act, introduced by Representative Kim.
This bill protects veterans by ensuring that the Department of
Veterans Affairs reviews and updates its systems and policies to
minimize overpayments in the future and mitigate negative effects on
veterans.
Now, under certain circumstances, if the Department of Veterans
Affairs makes accounting errors that result in overpayment of benefits,
veterans are left saddled with debt. Then, within a short period of
time, these veterans are required to pay these overpayments back to VA,
placing an extraordinary financial burden on them.
The VA can, and sometimes does, withhold part of veterans' monthly
benefit checks to recover overpayments, exacerbating these financial
hardships.
In some cases, VA may send these debts to a debt collection agency,
compounding veterans' financial stress.
If the information submitted by VA to a consumer reporting agency is
incorrect either because VA later determines its payment was not in
error or
[[Page H8756]]
because VA decides to waive the debt, veterans may still suffer harm to
their credit. This bill makes sure VA rights this wrong.
Under this legislation, VA would be required to instruct the consumer
reporting agency to remove any erroneous information from veterans'
consumer reports. And if VA employs a debt collection agency and that
agency then reports erroneous information to a consumer reporting
agency, VA must instruct the debt agency to fix the error.
Importantly, this bill also requires VA to maintain future tracking
metrics. This information tracks the number of VA overpayments, average
amount of overpayment, and how often VA grants and denies veterans'
requests for relief from this debt.
As we know, VA's information technology system hinders its ability to
manage erroneous or duplicate payments. That is why this legislation
requires an audit of overpayments, so whether it is its staffing
shortages or IT failures, data can guide VA and Congress on where
resources should be directed.
I wholeheartedly support this legislation to financially protect
veterans, because it is an essential step that we need to take to
ensure that veterans are not forced to face severe consequences due to
VA's mistakes.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DAVID P. ROE of Tennessee. Madam Speaker, I yield myself as much
time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 4360, the VA
Overpayment Accountability Act.
Veterans receive overpayments for many reasons. For example, a
veteran may erroneously receive drill pay and disability compensation
at the same time. A veteran may reduce their course load after their GI
Bill payment has been sent from the Department of Veterans Affairs to
the school, or a veterans' marital status may have changed, but they
continue to receive additional compensation for dependents. As a
result, VA creates a debt that the veteran must pay back.
In some instances, the veteran may be aware that he or she had been
overpaid and that VA will most likely ask them to return the money, but
in other circumstances, they may not.
I am concerned that many overpayments are caused by VA's negligence,
not the veterans.
Unexpectedly receiving a debt notification letter can create big
problems for veterans and their families, especially if they can't
afford to pay VA back; therefore, it is critical that the VA has the
tools it needs to effectively prevent overpayments, and that if certain
types of overpayments are unavoidable, VA's recoupment process is fair
and considerate for veterans.
This bill is sponsored by Congressman Andy Kim from New Jersey and
is intended to ensure that veterans are not unduly harmed by VA's debt
collection process.
Madam Speaker, I appreciate his leadership on this issue, and I urge
my colleagues to support H.R. 4360.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. TAKANO. Madam Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from
New Jersey (Mr. Kim), my good friend.
Mr. KIM. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Madam Speaker, I rise today because America's veterans deserve
America's best. They deserve the best healthcare and the best
government service.
I introduced this bipartisan VA Overpayment Accountability Act with
Congressman French Hill, because sometimes our veterans do not receive
the best.
Through several programs, the Department of Veterans Affairs provides
monthly payments to veterans and other beneficiaries. Because the VA
often relies on outdated systems to provide those payments, those
recipients sometimes receive overpayments at no fault of their own.
When this happens, it is the veteran who pays a price.
In order to compensate for their mistake, the VA will withhold
payment from veterans.
At a time in which 1.4 million veterans across the United States are
struggling with poverty issues, withholding payment can have severe
consequences for Americans who earned these benefits.
Because there is no limit on how much the VA can ask a vet to repay
and no limit on how far back it can go to collect the debt, these sums
can impact the credit and financial stability of veterans.
The VA Overpayment Accountability Act aims to fix these issues by
improving the VA IT systems that are often the cause of these
overpayments. It also provides credit protection for veterans who are
the victims of overpayments and become targets of unfair practices.
As a grateful Nation, we should aim to honor our veterans, not send
debt collectors after them because of a failure at the Department of
Veterans Affairs.
Barbara Kim-Hagemann, the State Commander of the Department of New
Jersey Veterans of Foreign Wars said in her endorsement remarks of this
bill that it is imperative that Congress work to correct ``harsh
Veterans Administration procedures in recouping benefit overpayments
from veterans who are barely living paycheck to paycheck.''
Madam Speaker, on behalf of the thousands of veterans that Barbara
fights for every day and the millions across our country who sacrificed
in their service, I call on my colleagues to join me and Congressman
Hill in this bipartisan effort to make the VA work and honor our
veterans.
Mr. DAVID P. ROE of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the
gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Hill), my good friend.
He is incredibly committed to our veterans. I have toured two
different veterans' medical centers in his home State of Arkansas.
Mr. HILL of Arkansas. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Tennessee
and my good friend from California for their leadership of our
Veterans' Affairs Committee. They are a dynamic duo. I appreciate the
opportunity to be on the floor to be in support of this list of good
bills tonight.
Mr. Speaker, I particularly want to thank my friend from New Jersey,
Mr. Kim, for his hard work and collaboration on this important bill for
our veterans.
Mr. Speaker, in the last 5 years I have served in this House, I have
had over 3,200 cases completed and closed for veterans in my district.
As a former community banker, when I look at those cases and I listen
to these stories, this too often is a challenge for our veterans. It is
a crazy challenge. Mr. Speaker, that withholding a payment can have
severe consequences for our brave veterans who are out there just doing
their job, through no fault of their own and through a computer mess up
or an IT problem, our veterans receive an overpayment and then suddenly
get a letter a few weeks later saying, ``Oh, hey, we made a mistake.
You owe us $5,000 back.''
Well, the normal American, Mr. Speaker, doesn't have that kind of
financial planning expertise, and relies on the quality of our VA
services to not make mistakes like that.
So it is a pleasure to work with Mr. Kim on this measure to try to
improve that situation and answer the IG's own report at the VA that
this is a serious problem affecting over 1.5 million veterans.
This bill tries to tackle this issue by improving Veterans
Administration IT systems, which are often the cause of this challenge,
and offers veterans that unknowingly are forced to go without their
earned benefits for extended periods of time some recourse on being a
victim of an overpayment and have their credit impaired.
I am proud to represent veterans from Camp Robinson and Little Rock
Air Force Base in our central Arkansas area. I am proud to work on
something that rectifies a common problem across this country.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from New Jersey for his work and for
the leadership of the committee for bringing this bill to the House
floor.
Mr. DAVID P. ROE of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of
my time.
Mr. TAKANO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I want to extend, again, my gratitude for the insightful
and hard work that the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Kim) has done
with this legislation to correct an injustice
[[Page H8757]]
which has been occurring. I thank Congressman Kim for this very
important legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I also want to extend my gratitude to the gentleman from
Arkansas (Mr. Hill), whose district I have visited and whose medical
center I have also visited. And I have to say that he runs a crack
operation. That came out wrong.
He runs, not a crack operation, but amazing constituent services for
his veterans.
You know, this unfortunate situation where the VA overpays veterans
and then claws back those payments will be corrected by this
legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I want to say I have no further speakers and I am
prepared to close.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
{time} 1700
Mr. DAVID P. ROE of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time
as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I don't know about New Jersey and California, but a
crack operation where we are is a good one, so I think I would take
that as a compliment.
I thank Mr. Kim and my good friend Mr. Hill for their work on this.
It does create, as the chairman said, tremendous anxiety and problems
for our veterans. It is needless. Many times, it is just a bureaucratic
mistake. I think all of us have suffered those with the IRS or
whomever, so this is a way to correct that. I thank these Members for
bringing it up.
Mr. Speaker, I strongly support this bill, and I urge Members to.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. TAKANO. Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to join me in
passing H.R. 4360, and I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Beyer). The question is on the motion
offered by the gentleman from California (Mr. Takano) that the House
suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 4360.
The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the
rules were suspended and the bill was passed.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
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