Total Disability based on Individual Unemployability (TDIU) examines whether a veteran's service-connected disabilities prevent them from maintaining substantially gainful employment, even if their disabilities do not combine to reach a 100% rating. TDIU represents one of the most nuanced areas of veterans' disability law.
Claims involving disputed effective dates—the date the veteran became unemployable due to service-connected disabilities—are particularly complex and time-consuming, requiring counsel to comb through years of medical records, employment history, and VA claims files to identify informal claims or evidence proving unemployability existed before the assigned date.
At the Law Office of Sean Kendall, our experienced veterans disability lawyers help U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard veterans navigate the VA bureaucracy to secure the benefits they deserve. You fought for us. Now, we fight for you.
Keep reading to learn how Sean Kendall and Associate Attorney Megan J. Kondrachuk overcame significant evidentiary hurdles to win a challenging TDIU effective date case and considerable backpay for a veteran who had been fighting for benefits for more than a decade.
Our Client
Our client was a Vietnam-era veteran with service-connected heart and psychiatric conditions and a particularly complicated TDIU effective date case. When he hired us in 2022, the VA had increased the disability rating for his post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to 70 percent in July of that year, approving his TDIU claim with an effective date of March 2021. However, the client believed he was entitled to back pay for an effective date that went back much further—to 2012—due to a lack of substantially gainful employment.
TDIU cases involving effective date and back pay disputes are notoriously complex, making it difficult for veterans—and their attorneys—to determine whether they’re entitled to an earlier effective date. A careful review of the relevant records often reveals that an earlier date isn’t warranted or that there is insufficient evidence to prove the veteran’s stated effective date to the VA.
Despite these challenges, Attorney Kondrachuk took the case, determined to do what she could to assist the veteran.
Our Advocacy
As Attorney Kondrachuk painstakingly combed through the client’s records, she discovered that he filed his initial TDIU claim in December 2013, submitting extensive documentation about his inability to maintain substantial employment due to his service-connected PTSD and heart condition. Despite clear evidence from multiple C&P exams showing that his psychiatric symptoms severely impaired his ability to work with others and his heart condition precluded manual labor, the VA repeatedly denied his claim.
Through careful investigation of the record, we also uncovered a critical procedural error. The client had properly appealed his TDIU denial, and VA representatives had repeatedly confirmed that his appeal was pending. However, the VA erroneously treated his 2021 submission as a new claim rather than a continuation of his original appeal. By meticulously documenting statements from VA Congressional liaisons confirming the pending status of his appeal and citing precedential cases establishing that TDIU claims remain open until properly adjudicated, Attorney Kondrachuk built a compelling case that the client’s TDIU claim had been continuously pursued since March 2012. When the Board restricted his effective date to 2021 without addressing this evidence, she appealed.
Our Result
Attorney Kondrachuk pursued justice for the client at every level of the VA appeals system—from the initial Regional Office denial through the Board of Veterans' Appeals and ultimately to the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (CAVC). Through detailed legal briefing demonstrating that her client's TDIU claim had remained pending since 2012, she secured a remand that compelled the Regional Office to grant the earlier effective date and nine years of additional disability compensation, resulting in more than $106,000 in retroactive benefits.
She was able to advance the client’s appeal on the Board of Veterans’ Appeals docket based on his age, filing a motion for expedited consideration that resulted in a much faster decision.
“The VA was pulling my chain for over a decade,” our client said. “Once I connected with you, I knew I was in better hands. You understood the issue, worked diligently, pulled out all the stops, and got them to admit that they were not only negligent, but attempting to sabotage a case by ignoring important information—and you prevailed. You also kept me in the loop about everything, and returned my calls and emails in a timely manner. Thank you.”