Rao bulletin 15 October 2013 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles

The total amount of debt that you currently owe and available credit lines is the most visible and shows each credit account in your name, how much you owe and the maximum credit line. For revolving accounts such as credit cards, the report will show a credit limit and for installment loans, it will show the highest balance along with the minimum monthly payment. The accounts that are active will be listed first and the accounts that are dormant or closed will be listed later. After seven years of no activity, the closed accounts will ultimately fall off the report. For example, say you have a credit card with a $10,000 credit line and a $2,000 balance. The report will read something like:

In addition to your creditors, payments and balances is information regarding your payment history. Credit reports will show if any payments were made 30 days past the due date on the account. In addition, payment patterns will also be reflected with payments made more than 60, 90 or 120 days past the due date. Sometimes consumers make a payment on the 16th when the payment was due on the 10th and is considered “late” by the creditor and a late fee will likely be charged. However, the credit report won’t show the payment as late because it was not more than 30 days past the 10th of the month. The credit report will also show when the last payment was made and the minimum amount the creditor requires each month.

Credit inquiries is a listing of creditors who have looked into your credit report at your request. For example, if you applied for a mortgage and last month you also bought and financed a new car, then your credit report will list two credit inquiries. Why do VA lenders care about inquiries? When determining affordability of a mortgage, lenders evaluate your current income and debt load. Because information on a credit report can be at least 30 days old, it’s possible that your new car payment won’t appear on the credit report until next month. That could affect your ability to repay your mortgage. The lender wants to know a little more about that inquiry on the report.

Finally, your credit scores are listed with each repository providing its own. Credit scores are factored based upon a consumer’s recent credit patterns and take into consideration the categories mentioned in this article, payment history, amounts owed, inquiries and so on. There will be three credit scores and the VA lender will toss out the highest and the lowest and use the middle score for purposes of approving the loan. The VA does not issue guidelines regarding a minimum credit score but most VA lenders do, and that minimum score is 620 but can vary from lender to lender. Additional information about you is found on your credit report including where you’ve lived and worked along with any public records associated with your name. If you want to take a look at your credit report before applying for a mortgage, you can get a free report at www.annualcreditreport.com, a site sponsored by the three main credit repositories. Otherwise, once you apply for a mortgage, your lender will send you a copy of what they see. If you have any questions or see some obvious errors, call your VA loan officer for help.

• 
  Peripheral artery disease
  
• 
  Ischemic heart disease
  
• 
  Carotid artery disease
  
• 
  Stroke
  
• 
  Kidney disease
  
• 
  Hypertension
  
• 
  Diseases of the eye
  

• 
  Back pain resulting from a hip condition.
  
• 
  Medication for PTSD that causes erectile dysfunction.
  
• 
  Tinnitus that accompanies service-connected hearing loss.
  
• 
  Depression or other mental illness resulting from losses caused by service-connected injuries, such as traumatic brain injury, hearing loss and other life-changing injuries.
  
• 
  Heart disease arising from service-connected hypertension.
  
• 
  Heart disease resulting from certain service-connected amputations
  

• 
  Be sure you have good evidence that the new disability was the result of an accepted service-connected disability.
  
• 
  It is likely that you will need an expert medical opinion about the cause and effect relationship of your service-connected disability and your new condition.
  
• 
  Your primary, or first, service-connected condition must be on record.
  
• 
  It is important that your medical records show diagnosis and treatment of the secondary condition
  

Currently the Murrieta clinic serves 7,762 veterans from across Southwest Riverside County. On a typical day between 70 and 90 patients are seen at the Murrieta clinic. “We have a full mixture of veterans that we serve here,” said Jim Rich, public affairs officer for VA Loma Linda. “We even have a couple of patients who are over 100 years old.”

"More than 250,000 veterans with claim appeals have already waited an average of four years for VA to decide their appealed claim, and it is unacceptable that our veterans will be forced to wait even longer [because of the shutdown delays]," said Glenn Bergmann, a former VA lawyer whose firm, Bergmann & Moore, LLC, handles disability claim appeals. "During a shutdown, veterans and their attorneys won't be able to learn the status of claim appeals or have hearings," Bergmann said. [Source: Mil.com | Bryant Jordan | 3 Oct 2013 ++]