On August 24, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims issued an important precedential decision in Hoffman v. Collins, No. 24-7834, addressing how VA may apply an Intent to File (ITF) when a veteran has multiple claims pending. An ITF can protect an earlier effective date if the veteran files a completed claim within one year. In Hoffman, however, VA treated the veteran’s ITF as already “used” by a supplemental claim, preventing him from receiving an earlier effective date for new claims filed within that same one-year period.
Mr. Hoffman filed an ITF on February 28, 2023. In May 2023, he filed a supplemental claim continuing his pursuit of previously denied claims for kidney disease, hearing loss, and Meniere’s disease. Then, in July 2023, he filed new claims for stroke residuals and erectile dysfunction and specifically asked VA to associate those claims with his February ITF. VA granted the new claims but assigned a July effective date, reasoning that the May supplemental claim had already consumed the ITF because it was the first claim filed after it.
The Court rejected VA’s approach. The key was that Mr. Hoffman’s May supplemental claim was continuously pursued. Under 38 U.S.C. § 5110(a)(2), a continuously pursued claim can retain the date of the original application. Because the claims underlying Mr. Hoffman’s supplemental claim predated his February ITF, associating the ITF with that supplemental claim provided him no effective-date benefit at all. Instead, it simply prevented him from using the ITF for his later claims, where it actually mattered. The Court held that VA cannot apply 38 C.F.R. § 3.155(d)(1)(ii) in this manner because doing so effectively wastes the veteran’s ITF.
The Court therefore reversed the Board’s denial of an earlier effective date for Mr. Hoffman’s stroke residuals and ordered VA to assign February 28, 2023, the date of his ITF. It remanded the effective dates for erectile dysfunction and related special monthly compensation because additional factual findings were necessary to determine when entitlement to those benefits arose.
Hoffman is significant for veterans who are pursuing older denied claims while also preparing to file new claims. VA cannot “burn” an ITF on a continuously pursued supplemental claim when the ITF provides no benefit to that claim, only to then deny its effective-date protection for a later claim. Veterans who have had an ITF followed by both a supplemental claim and a new claim within the same one-year period should carefully review whether VA assigned the correct effective date.
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