Over 122,000 US veterans who received one-time special separation benefits (SSB) in the past three decades for willingly abandoning their service when the US was reducing its active-duty personnel count were stripped of their disability benefits from the US Department of Veteran Affairs (VA). In recent years, veterans applying for disability benefits through the VA were surprised when informed all checks would stop coming until they returned the SSB benefits received when the US military asked them to leave service.
Even some experts were unaware of a law that prevents veterans from receiving both disability and SSB payouts. The rule allows the VA to recover SSB payouts from veterans before they can receive disability payments.
