Hi, I have been on here quite a few times searching the forums for all kinds of questions and have founds lots of answers. I am in the Air Force and I am being meb'd for l4/l5 petruding/bulging disc in my back. It all happened in July 2012. I have already been through my c&p exams and just signed my NARSUM yesterday. My peblo said my paperwork got sent up to IPEB yesterday as well. My question is, I know it's not a guaranteed thing, but what do you guys think. Since it has already went through once and found unfit at the small board and is being sent up a second time will it be found unfit? or will I be sent back to duty with a code. Any comments would be appreciated, thanks.
Question on being found fit or unfit
- Thread starter acoolusername
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I was declared unfit within a week but have been at the VA since Oct 7. i was originally told that it will be 30-45 days for my preliminary findings to come back. I am on day 37 now, the VA told me that my case has been reviewed by the C&P people in Providence and it is now at the rating officer. I was told this about a week ago and I still haven't gotten any word, so hopefully I know soon and I will keep everyone updated for timelines so people can actually plan there future, which seems to be an after thought furing this process.
Yes.
Well hopefully you get it in the next few days..yea and I don't understand why they can't keep you informed, its weird.
That's freakin awesome.
Grizz, why would my PEBLO act like she doesn't know anything? I just hate wondering if I was found unfit or not. It's like I need to hear it from my PEBLO or someone or see a piece of paper lol. I hate being so impatient but I just want to know so I can start TAPS and all of that stuff and get it over with. Since the first time I checked ebenefits it has said "review of evidence" does this mean it has already went through, claim recieved, under review,...etc?
Thank you
You should go ahead and schedule your TAPS classes, the VA received your case from the PEB which means they found you unfit and they're assigning a rating officer. Don't rely on your PEBLO to keep you informed as most of them don't. I understand your impatience, Providence has had mine for about 50 days now and should be taking some sort of action by the end of the month. The limbo feeling sucks, but unfortunately we can't do anything about it but be as proactive as possible on the situation.
I took your advice and set up my Taps class for Dec. Hopefully my PEBLO can just keep me up to date with it all. I'm sort of just fed up with trying to find out and just wait the 4 months she said it is going to take..
Indeed, it shall definitely minimize the already heighten anxiety and stress levels for sure in my opinion, but still remain positively proactive!
To that extent, you are not alone in the DoD IDES "waiting game" process; I am still awaiting another decision from the USAPDA NCRPEB in reference to my request for the acceptance of or denial rejection to the scheduling of a formal PEB hearing!
Thus, I quite often comment that "possessing well-informed knowledge is truly a powerful equalizer."
Best Wishes!
Shoot, reading this post I emailed my PEBLO and asked about my unFit memo. She just emailed it to me, makes one wonder how long she had it. Then I asked her, So where we are at this point what are we looking at as a time-line? She said that VA is back-logged and it'll be 6-8 months to hear back... WOW
Dang, 6-8 months? Yea apparently the Air Force doesn't give you unfit memos so I have no idea whats going on until the very end. It's a dumb process
Hey I'm also Air Force and I had the same problem as you. My PEBLO refuses to check the VTA and she refuses to do her job. This forum is really the best advice. Here's how I've learned to do things. So for you, and everyone else who reads this, I'm going to tell you the legit way of finding out. I've learned with the VA it's not what you just say but it's how you word it. So this is what I did:
Step 1: Call the VA at 1-877-827-1000
Step 2: When you dial press 1 then 0 then 1 to get a hold time for them to call you back. (Listen for male recorded voice to assure you'll have a call back time. Female voice on the second one means they're busy)
Step 3: Press 1 when the VA calls you back and
Step 4: Immediately tell the VA person you are looking to verify/make sure that the air force has sent (verbatim) "Findings and recommended disposition of USAF Physical evaluation board," and that (insert condition here) is under CAT I. Tell them number 12 on the form says unfit on it.
Step 5: Tell them that you wanted to make sure that the Air Force sent it to them/ uploaded it to the VA.
Step 6: End conversation with them and go to the IRIS https://iris.custhelp.com/app/ask/session/L3RpbWUvMTM4NDQ4OTAyNy9zaWQvdzZQaHhuRmw= and put down in your claim that you wish for your regional office to mail you the findings of the IPEB and you want a copy of the records sent to your house. (It included my 356 in the mail. I know because I did this.)
Step 7: If they ever tell you to ask your PEBLO reply with "My PEBLO is Clueless" which is why most of us are here and reading all of this in the first place.
Then mission complete!!
Here's an uploaded clean copy of the 1st AF 356:
Also I noticed from all this that for Air Force, when they do the initial RILO, they either pick RTD or medboardable conditions. If AFPC picked condition is boardable, there's a very very very strong chance that the result is UNFIT. The Air Force is too overmanned to retain you. I'm in a control afsc too and they still put unfit. Even on mine when they did a med board my base put down RTD and said I had this condition prior to joining and the IPEB still put unfit and compensatable. The med board from your base means squat. Basically during that stage I would submit letters from your supervisor though to endorse your desired outcome. And still appeal the MEB if you disagree with them. I can upload my impartial review and rebuttal if needed to anyone reading this. Just PM me.
Hope this helps I've been in this for about a year now thanks to the doctor putting me in at the wrong base for a few months. Good times....please all ask any questions you have to me and I'm always happy to respond. I'll also make a post of how to for this.
Cheers!
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insanesnwbrdr
PEB Forum Regular Member
Peblo didnt know I was found unfit untill he got notified of the my proposed ratings. Called the va guy that set up my appointments for qtc about 60 days after the appointments and he let it slip that I was found unfit.
The thing is about though is that if they checked the VTA they would see that they uploaded it. That's the ridiculous part. It takes them under a minute to find this out. But thank God for the VA. It really is hit and miss with those guys. Some know exactly what you're talking about and others are completely clueless. But that's awesome yours was from a local one. I tried that and they didn't even know what the VTA was at my local va. And they thought is wasn't at providence but all of your stuff goes to providence unless you're army.
I talked to my MSC's supervisor on the phone earlier this year and he had no clue how IDES worked and when I quoted the IDES timeline in my conversation with him he didn't even know it existed... How could he supervise the MSC who is a huge part of the IDES process and not even understand how it is supposed to work? I guess that's a good thing for my MSC because he can do the worst job in the country and his supervisor is oblivious to what he is doing.
Holy crap thanks for taking the time to type that out. I just called and left a message for them to call back, I hope that they have received that form. Your post should be a sticky on the forum but the number to the VA is 1800 not 1877, lol I called that and it was some dating site or something.
They called back, he said they have not received that form yet and I should ask my PEBLO more about it. He said that they won't do anything until they get the dd214.. I don't know what to believe.
It is my belief that the person you called didn't know how to answer your question so you got a generic answer that doesn't apply to members within the IDES system. Calling the VA's toll free number is like playing the lottery and more often than not you will lose and get the rep who isn't familiar with IDES cases, the one who won't tell you even though they seem to know, and then every once in a while you will get the one will actually tell you something.
I actually had one of them blow me off and then when they finished not answering my questions the rep asked me was there anything else they could help me with and I responded to her that it would be nice if she would just answer my initial question. She hung up on me... I then did an IRIS inquiry and got a call back the same day with someone who apologized to me 15 times or more and this person was more than happy to answer all my questions.
Playing the lottery is a great comparison to the the representatives on the phone for the VA. Very few are experienced enough to handle IDES calls, and even so they still lack knowledge to fully explain things. I find that by calling the VA it does nothing but raise my anxiety even more than it already is. I can't believe they don't have a better system in place to keep veterans informed on their claim status. It's simply unacceptable to say the least, all we can do is keep each other educated through this site and compare our situations with others to gain better knowledge.