Veterans Benefits Consultant's Training Package

Contents of the Veterans Benefits Consultants Package

The bulk of the Handbook is devoted to the aid and attendance benefit. After reading Chapter 6 and Chapter 7 in the book, you should have a fairly good understanding of how the claims process for Pension or Death Pension works. We have also given you some case studies to help you understand how to help your clients meet the asset test and how a typical claim unfolds. Finally, the book comes with software that helps you estimate the Pension income before and after asset transfers or conversions.

257 pages
Table of Contents

If you are not familiar with Medicaid rules since the Deficit Reduction Act, you need to read the Medicaid secrets book by Elder Law Attorney Gabriel Heiser so that you have a better understanding of how to advise your clients on what could happen if they need to apply for Medicaid. Failure to do Medicaid planning with clients who have transferred assets to qualify for the VA benefit may result in the family coming back to you and possibly even suing you. Be careful. If you are uncomfortable with Medicaid planning with your clients then you need to involve an someone who understands these issues in order to protect yourself.

209 pages
Table of Contents

This book is designed to provide information for a successful claim for those individuals who choose to do it on their own. You need to have this option available if you do not have a suitable service organization to refer your clients to. You can provide this book for do-it-yourselfers to avoid your becoming involved in the claims process or to avoid your taking a great deal of time for those individuals whom you cannot help with estate planning or asset reallocation. You can also direct them to our website to purchase the book.

260 pages
Table of Contents

This manual is to be used hand-in-hand with the aid and attendance handbook and possibly the Medicaid secrets book to provide the necessary training for you to organize and manage your consulting practice. Many of the strategies and ideas in this book will allow you to provide services that your competitors do not provide. This allows you to offer unique services in the community and expand your practice. The book also contains a number of marketing ideas and strategies to help you attract more clients and customers to your service.

A uniquely targeted, one-year listing of your services as a veterans benefits consultant that is tied to the most highly visited page on our website -- one that deals with veterans benefits. Only those people who have purchased our consultants package are allowed to participate in this unique listing service.

This popular page receives 4,000 to 5,000 hits a month, and you will likely receive a number of leads from this year-long listing. This listing page is reserved only for veterans benefits consultants who own our consultants package. It produces more lead requests from site users than all of the other thousands of listings on our site combined. Our website -- www.longtermcarelink.net -- receives approximately 700,000 hits a month.

At the end of your first year, you can renew this listing service beginning at $19.00 a month. For more information and to view a sample of this listing please go to www.veteransListing.com. Your listing on this page is linked to a unique veterans benefits website that we create for you. This is included in your consultants package.

Click here to see one of the listing pages

A uniquely targeted website. You recieve two design options for this web site. To see the two examples of the targeted websites that we create for you please go to www.utahveterans.com or www.veteransutah.com. These are websites for Chris Merrill who is a veterans benefits consultant in Utah. Chris does planning for long term care and provides veterans benefits information, which is part of this service. By having additional websites to describe his veterans consulting service, Chris is generating more internet inquiries than he would with just his planning site.

A packet of 20 veterans benefits booklets titled "Long Term Care Benefits for Veterans" to be used as an educational handout, as instructions for those who wish to file claims on their own and as the textbook for our presentation system described below. (80 pages.) Your ownership of the consulting package allows you to purchase more booklets at our cost of $1.50 apiece which includes printing, handling and shipping. You must order additional copies of this book in quantities of 20 or more.

A PDF template for a color brochure to promote veterans benefits consulting. This brochure is an 8 1/2 x 11 document printed on both sides and tri-folded with a blank panel on the back panel for inserting your contact information.

An article and news release packet containing 20 copyright-free articles on veterans benefits that you may use for any purpose. Examples of using these articles would include:

• use on your website,
• use on your personal blog,
• as a mailer to your existing clients,
• for newspaper or magazine feature articles or
• for seniors publications.

Also included in this package is 1 news releases for use in your local community.

Click here for a list of the articles

TABLE OF CONTENTS STATE VETERANS HOMES.................................................1

THE APPEAL OF LIVING IN A STATE VETERANS HOME...........................................................................1
SERVICES AVAILABLE............................................................................................................................3
ELIGIBILITY AND APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS FOR STATE VETERANS HOMES....................................4

VETERANS HEALTH CARE LONG TERM CARE.............5

THE BEST HEALTH CARE SYSTEM IN AMERICA......................................................................................5
WHY THE VA HEALTH CARE SYSTEM WORKS SO WELL........................................................................7
WHAT IS VETERANS HEALTH CARE?......................................................................................................9
OUTPATIENT PHARMACY SERVICES.....................................................................................................10
VETERANS HEALTH ADMINISTRATION LONG TERM CARE BENEFITS....................................................11
ENROLLING IN THE VETERANS HEALTH CARE SYSTEM........................................................................15
CO-PAYMENTS FOR MEDICAL SERVICES—VETERANS MEANS TESTING.............................................16

DISABILITY INCOME: COMPENSATION & PENSION........................19

INTRODUCTION TO VA PENSION, COMPENSATION & VA PENSION WITH AID AND ATTENDANCE.........19
ELIGIBILITY RULES FOR PENSION.........................................................................................................23
THE SPECIAL CASE OF LONG TERM CARE, RECURRING MEDICAL EXPENSES....................................28
USING AID AND ATTENDANCE TO PAY ANY PERSON FOR CARE IN THE HOME....................................31
USING AID AND ATTENDANCE FOR PROFESSIONAL HOME CARE SERVICES........................................33
USING AID AND ATTENDANCE TO PAY FOR ASSISTED LIVING..............................................................36
USING AID AND ATTENDANCE TO PAY FOR A NURSING HOME.............................................................37
UNDERSTANDING THE APPLICATION PROCESS FOR AID AND ATTENDANCE PENSION.........................43
SUBMITTING A CLAIM FOR THE VETERANS AID AND ATTENDANCE PENSION BENEFIT.........................49

DEATH CLAIMS AND SPECIAL BENEFITS.....................51

DEATH BENEFITS AVAILABLE FROM VA FORM 21-534........................................................................51
ACCRUED BENEFITS............................................................................................................................51
VA BURIAL ALLOWANCES.....................................................................................................................52
OTHER DEATH BENEFITS.....................................................................................................................52
HISA GRANTS.....................................................................................................................................53


This CD is intended to be used w/ the Aid & Attendance Handbook. It contains forms, worksheets and benefits estimates software for estimating aid and attendance Pension income before and after asset transfers.	We provide three CDs each with a PowerPoint slide presentation. The first CD is for a 30 minute presentation, the second for a 45 minute presentation and the third for a 90 minute to 120 minute presentation. On the document CD furnished with your system, we also include all 35 slides so that you can mix and match your own presentation and create your own PowerPoint lecture. We also provide each slide in JPEG format in case you want to use the slides in some other way. All of the information in the presentation system comes from the booklets provided with your package -- "Long Term Care Benefits for Veterans." Please read the booklet thoroughly and study the information so that you understand it and can answer questions. Each attendee will also receive a copy of the booklet either in pamphlet form or in a letter size format. If you understand the information in the booklet, you should have no problem presenting the material on the slides.

Under certain conditions, especially for some worksite presentations, it is not practical to use a PowerPoint presentation or to use a DVD slide presentation. This CD contains printed lecture notes to be used without slides and that you can reproduce and provide to your attendees in order to give them some visual aide support as you present the material.	Many locations where you well lecture will have a DVD player and a monitor. In some situations, it is more convenient and perhaps more effective to use the monitor instead of using a projector and PowerPoint. We provide three DVDs each with a timed slide presentation that contains slides identical to each of the three presentations available in PowerPoint. The first DVD is designed for a 30 minute presentation, the second for a 45 minute presentation and the third for a 90 minute to 120 minute presentation. Each slide displays for a period of five seconds. You simply need to put the DVD player on pause as you talk about each concept and then resume play to go to the next slide.

Below are 6 slides found in the presentation materials:

The Business Strategies Portion of the Package for Expanding Your Business

Using VA Caregiver Contracts for Finding New Clients or Customers
In some states caregiver contracts or personal service contracts are becoming a popular strategy for Medicaid planning. These contracts can also be used to provide evidence of family care arrangements for obtaining the veterans aid and attendance Pension. If they are set up appropriately for Medicaid as well, you can provide additional billable services.

Using the Tax Requirements for Paid Family Caregivers to Cement Your Relationship
Anyone paying a family member or any nonprofessional individual to provide care in the home becomes an employer and under IRS rules must have an employer identification number, must pay Social Security, unemployment and Medicare taxes and must provide a W-2. Under certain circumstances, federal and state income tax must also be withheld. This is a requirement that many people choose to ignore to their detriment. You can use this requirement to provide necessary verification to VA for making a claim and by helping people use appropriate tax service companies, you can submit your relationship and charge for your services in providing help.

Using Compliance in Representation to Stay Ahead of Your Competition
VA is moving the application process to three regional offices -- St. Paul, Milwaukee and Philadelphia. Undoubtedly, this will allow the agency to better monitor non-accredited individuals and attorneys who are submitting claims. We suspect as well, that VA will require anyone providing information on the claims process to register under some yet to be determined category. If you are complying with the regulations in the representation of claims you should have no problem. Your competitors who are not complying may get shut down. This gives you an advantage in staying ahead of those practitioners who are less informed and expanding your practice as theirs diminish.

Organizing a Long Term Care Planning Practice to Expand Services and Avoid Legal Restrictions
We believe that many individuals who are charging a fee for veterans benefits planning could run afoul of VA because this fee may be construed to apply to the application process is well. By organizing a long term care planning practice and covering a broader range of care planning issues, you can relegate the veterans consulting to a portion of a larger practice. The fees you charge can now relate to broader services and as long as your services are not exclusively for veterans benefits you should have an easier time in making a case for charging fees.

Understanding and Using Search Engine Optimization Strategies for Your Website
Regarding the creation of websites, many people believe that "if you build it they will come." Those who believe this come up against the stark reality that websites are oftentimes a waste of money if you don't understand how to use them to create leads. We provide you a number of strategies that we have learned over the years to optimize a website for search engines such that you create traffic to the site. This in turn should provide leads from that website.

Providing 15 Different Financial Strategies for Long Term Care Planning
We discuss the use of 15 financial strategies that can be applied by seniors to preserve assets, to accumulate wealth and to minimize taxes.

Obtaining the Pension Benefit for Personal Care Arrangements
About 70% of all long term care in this country is provided in the home usually by family members who are not paid for their services. The Pension benefit can be used to reimburse family members. This strategy can also be used to hire friends or private persons to provide care in the home at a cheaper cost and hiring professional care providers. This allows more care to be provided than would otherwise be available. In Chapter 6 of the Operations Manual we discuss in greater detail how to put together a personal care arrangement with the caregiver agreement, billing documents and tax services. The family will need your expertise in this area because it is unlikely they can put together these arrangements themselves and satisfy the documentation requirements for VA to approve payment.