This Senior Veterans Claims Examiner serves as one of a group of Claims Examiners who determine entitlement and amount of Government Life Insurance payable under the USGLI, NSLI, VSLI, VIR, and SDVI programs.

Duties

Major Duties: Develops and evaluates evidence, determines entitlement and authorizes payments. Determines validity of beneficiary designations. Determines when field examinations are necessary, requests for handwriting analyses, and recommends when delayed awards should be inserted. Determines when payments should be made to estate of insured or beneficiary. Determines existence or absence of extra hazards of service. Determines proper settlement shares under applicable state domiciliary laws of descent and distribution. Prepares Administrative decision statements of the case. Prepares testamentary capacity decisions. Calculates commuted values in contingent award cases and total and permanent disability cases. Responds to written and telephone inquiries. Conducts systematic analyses and written reports for division management. Prepares Congressional correspondence. Provides day-to-day technical guidance and assistance to lower graded claims examiners. Conducts case reviews on lower graded employees, as assigned, to assist the supervisor in conducting his/her monthly performance reviews.

Requirements

• You must be a U.S. citizen to apply for this job
• Selectees are subject to a background/suitability investigation
• Selective Service registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959
• A probationary period may be required for employees and supervisors

Qualifications

Time-in-grade: Applicants who are federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements. For a GS-11 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-9 level. If you previously held a higher grade, you must also submit any SF-50 showing that grade. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must also submit your most recent promotion or within-grade increase in addition to your recent SF-50. DO NOT submit Award SF-50's and/or General Adjustment SF-50's as they cannot be used to prove time-in-grade. See the required documents section for more information. Specialized Experience: To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement. To qualify, applicants must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade (GS-9) in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: positions that have involved experience in the development, examination, investigation, adjudication, and authorization of claims for disability compensation, disability pension, dependency and indemnity-compensation, death pension benefits, life insurance benefits, etc. Such experience is to be substantive and relevant to the position being filled. OR Applicants may substitute education for the experience required for the GS-11 level. Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree or 3 full years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.M., if related. Such education must demonstrate the competencies necessary to do the work. OR Applicants may also combine education and experience to qualify at the GS-11 level: Equivalent combinations of specialized experience and PH.D. graduate education. To compute, divide your total months of qualifying experience by 12. Then divide your semester hours of graduate education beyond two years by 18. Add the two percentages. The total percentage must equal at least 100% to qualify.

Education

A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education.

Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for federal employment. You can verify your education here. If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education.

Contacts

• Address Philadelphia VBA Regional Office 5000 Wissahickon Ave Philadelphia, PA 19144 US
• Name: Janelle Phillips
• Phone: (313) 471-3888
• Email: [email protected]