JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A mix-up between the Veterans Affairs Administration and University of North Florida has some local veterans frustrated and saying they can't move on with their lives.
There is a program called vocational rehabilitation for disabled veterans at UNF that helps them with job placement. Essentially, the VA pays UNF and that's how the program is funded. But when there was a delay in payment from the feds, veterans said they started having problems.
The wife of a veteran in the school's vocational rehabilitation program sent an email to News4Jax which said, "(Vets) are being prevented from getting jobs or receiving degrees or grants owed to them because of the very program designed to help them. UNF was never paid and even after they were notified of the problem they have still taken over a month and not paid the school still."
The veteran and his wife declined an on-camera interview but News4Jax did take these complaints to both the university and the VA who began looking into the issue.
According to Tracey Betts with the department of Veteran Affairs, there was a mix-up and for more than a month the VA's payment to UNF for the program didn't go through.
"The university submitted their billing document to us, the counselor who managed the individuals certified the document, sent it to our finance section, and it appears the finance section was where it was held up," Betts said. "From my understanding, the documents were provided to the finance section in late April, so a little more than a month."
The vets who complained said their problem has been with the VA, not UNF. But the university has taken action, telling News4Jax in a statement that, "UNF has moved the due date out, so it won't look like their accounts are past due, and veteran students can go online and get their transcripts."
The VA also said it is streamlining its process so this doesn't happen again.
"It's very important because they should've received their diploma the same time that everyone else did," Betts said.
UNF officials also said that as far as they know, no student has requested a copy of their transcript but the school is making them available online to avoid any potential future problems.