Back-Pay · Effective Date Calculator
What is your VA back-pay actually worth?
The VA pays retroactive compensation back to your effective date — usually your claim filed date or earlier intent-to-file date. A 50% rating granted 18 months after filing puts ~$20k in retro on the table. Most vets accept whatever shows up without checking it.
How effective dates actually work
- Intent-to-file (ITF) — if you filed VA Form 21-0966 (or called the 800 line and had an ITF logged), your effective date is that day, not the day you filed the actual 21-526EZ. ITFs are good for one year.
- PACT Act presumptive grants — if the condition was added under PACT and you filed within one year of the law’s effective date (8/10/2022), your effective date is the law’s effective date. Under Freund v. Collins, vets denied earlier may be entitled to back-pay reaching even further. Consult an accredited rep.
- CUE — Clear and Unmistakable Error — if a prior denial got the law or facts plainly wrong, a successful CUE motion can reach back to the date of that decision, even decades. High bar; consult a rep.
- Reopened / new-and-relevant — a Supplemental Claim (Form 20-0995) within 1 year of a denial preserves the original effective date if it succeeds. File late and the effective date resets to the supplemental filing date.
If your assigned effective date looks wrong: draft a 21-4138 explaining the earlier date you believe is correct, and file a Higher-Level Review (Form 20-0996) within 1 year of the decision letter. After 1 year, the only remaining lane is CUE.