WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 16th July, 2022) The US House of Representatives Oversight Committee is probing whether private records-retrieval companies are using a backlog of records requests for disability claims to profit through paid expedited services, according to letters sent by the panel's lawmakers to the companies on Friday.
"The Oversight Committee is investigating whether companies that retrieve records for veterans... are misusing National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) procedures intended to expedite emergency records requests while charging veterans to obtain government records they are entitled to receive at no cost," the letters said.
The lawmakers sent the letters to DD214 Direct, Aardvark Research Group and Angels Research. The companies charge between $79 and $99 to obtain DD214 forms that veterans use to receive benefits.
Veterans are entitled to receive the document at no cost, the letters said, adding that the private records-retrieval companies use emergency requests to prioritize certain cases at the NPRC.
The NPRC director identified a pattern in which veterans initially submit non-emergency requests for records but then later submit an emergency request through a private company, the letters said.
Emergency records requests increased from approximately 5,000 per year before the onset of the coronavirus pandemic-related backlog to more than 50,000 in 2021, 70% of which came from private companies, the letters also said.
The companies represent themselves as having particular knowledge of how to navigate government bureaucracy and expedite the records-request process, the letters said.
"NPRC prioritizes these emergency requests above other pending requests, exacerbating the office's backlog by creating duplicate requests, and potentially delaying NPRC's response to actual emergency requests," the letters added.
The lawmakers' letters requested the companies answer questions on their business practices and provide documents pertaining to their work by July 29.
The letters were signed by Oversight and Reform Committee Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney and National Security Subcommittee Chairman Stephen Lynch.
