My VA Claim Guide

Free VA claims roadmap, built by a veteran · Jeremy Hall, Army veteran — by his own account he climbed from 10% to 100% Permanent and Total, taking the last stretch himself after a no-win, no-fee firm stalled at 60%

A free 10-step roadmap that walks a claim from the first Intent to File to protecting the rating at the end, built around the Caluza Triangle: a current diagnosis, an in-service event, and a medical nexus tying them together. Around the roadmap sit a combined-ratings calculator, state-benefits pages, and a blog on the places claims actually break — denials, C&P exams, secondary connections. The site calls itself education, not legal advice, and sends anyone who needs representation to a VA-accredited VSO, agent, or attorney.

Why we carry them. One veteran’s worked map of the whole road, free, with the money step — lock your effective date first — put exactly where it belongs: step one.

Start here — their essential work

• The 10-Step VA Disability Claim Roadmap — The whole road on one page: four phases from locking your backpay date through building evidence and filing to appeals and protecting the win.
• VA Intent to File: Lock Your Backpay Date (Step 1) — Why the five-minute Intent to File comes before everything else, the one-year clock it starts, and what the paid ’no-win, no-fee’ route actually costs beside a free VSO.
• The Caluza Triangle: 3 Pillars of VA Disability Eligibility (Step 2) — The three things every claim must prove, and the four ways to connect a condition to service — direct, aggravation, presumptive, and secondary.
• Submitting the Claim: FDC vs Standard — Step 6 of the roadmap: how a Fully Developed Claim differs from a standard filing, and how to organize the evidence package either way.
• VA C&P Exam Tips: What to Say & What NOT to Say (Step 7) — How the rating exam actually works, the polite ‘I’m fine’ trap, describing your worst day, stopping when it hurts — and documenting a bad examiner while it still matters.
• Appeals & Reviews: The Pivot — Step 9: denied or rated too low — the three review lanes, Higher-Level Review, Supplemental Claim, and Board appeal, and how to pick between them.
• Free Help Filing a VA Disability Claim — The honest three-way choice — file it yourself with the roadmap, work with a free VSO, or bring in accredited paid help after a denial — and what to bring to any of them.

Summaries are ours. The work is theirs — we link to it, we don’t lift it. Visit My VA Claim Guide →