Veterans benefits after a death

What to do in the first days

Two things need to happen early, and both are easier at the start than later.

1. Find the discharge papers — the DD214 or its older equivalents. Almost every benefit here is proved with them, and a funeral home cannot arrange military honors or a national cemetery place without evidence of service. If they cannot be found, they can be requested from the National Archives, and that request is worth starting on day one because it takes time.
2. Tell the funeral home the person was a veteran, before arrangements are settled. Funeral homes handle VA paperwork routinely, they can request the burial flag, and the choice between a private cemetery and a national one changes what the family pays.

Burial in a VA national cemetery includes the grave, the opening and closing, a headstone or marker and perpetual care at no cost to the family. That is a large difference from a private plot, and it is a decision that has to be made before the funeral rather than after.

Who can be buried in a national cemetery

Wider than the phrase “national cemetery” suggests. Eligibility is not limited to the veteran: a spouse, a surviving spouse — including one who has since remarried — and a minor child may be eligible, and in some cases an unmarried adult dependent child.

A veteran who did not receive a dishonorable discharge is eligible, as is a service member who died on active duty or on active or inactive duty for training. Separate criteria cover National Guard and Reserve members and U.S. citizens who served with an allied force during wartime.

The surviving-spouse rule catches people out in both directions. A spouse who remarried after the veteran's death does not lose eligibility, and a spouse who died first can still be buried in the same national cemetery gravesite.^{Source 3}

A veteran buried in a private cemetery can still receive a government headstone or marker, or a medallion for an existing privately purchased headstone, plus a burial flag and a Presidential Memorial Certificate. Choosing a private cemetery does not forfeit the memorial items.

The burial allowance, and who may claim it

VA pays allowances toward burial and funeral costs, toward the plot or interment, and reimburses the cost of transporting the remains to a national cemetery. The amounts are set by VA and are updated, which is why this page names the entitlement and links to the current figures rather than quoting a number that will go stale.

The part that surprises people

The claimant is whoever paid, and does not have to be family. VA's own list includes the surviving spouse, a surviving partner of a legal union, a child, a parent, the executor or administrator, a family member or friend who is not the executor, and a representative of a funeral home or cemetery. If a friend paid for the funeral, the friend claims.^{Source 2}

Eligibility also turns on circumstance rather than only on service. Among the qualifying situations: the veteran died of a service-connected disability, died while receiving VA pension or compensation, died while getting VA care, or died with a claim for compensation or pension still pending. Burial allowances are not paid where the person died on active duty, while serving as a member of Congress, or while serving a federal prison sentence.^{Source 2}

You cannot claim what another organization has already reimbursed. If an employer or another government agency covered the funeral, the allowance is not available for the same costs.^{Source 2}

The deadline

This is the single most consequential fact on the page, and it is the one families learn about too late.

• If the death was service connected, there is no time limit for the burial or transportation allowance.
• If it was not, a claim must be filed within two years after the burial.
• That two-year limit does not apply where the veteran died while under VA care at a VA or VA-contracted facility.
• It also does not apply to a claim for the plot or interment allowance, or for transportation.
• If a discharge status is upgraded from dishonorable after the death, a claim must be filed within two years of that change.^{Source 1}

Read the exceptions before concluding you are out of time. A family told they missed the window is often still inside one of them — particularly where the veteran died in a VA facility, or where the claim is for the plot rather than the funeral.^{Source 1}

Ongoing payments to survivors

Separate from anything to do with the funeral, a survivor may be entitled to a continuing monthly payment. Dependency and Indemnity Compensation is a tax-free benefit for the surviving spouse, child or parent of a service member who died in the line of duty, or of a veteran who died from a service-related illness or injury.

For a surviving spouse, VA looks at whether the couple lived together without a break until the death — or whether a separation was the claimant's fault — and then at one of three tests: marriage within fifteen years of the discharge from the period of service in which the condition arose, marriage of at least a year, or a child of the marriage. Remarriage does not automatically end entitlement.^{Source 4}

If a DIC claim was denied in the past, it may be worth reapplying. VA states that survivors may now be eligible under the PACT Act and need not wait to be contacted before submitting a new application.^{Source 4}

There is also a needs-based Survivors Pension for the survivor of a wartime veteran, and accrued benefits — money VA owed the veteran but had not paid at death — which the estate or an eligible survivor may claim. Both are separate applications from DIC.

What else to ask for

• A burial flag, for a casket or to accompany an urn. Funeral homes usually request it.
• Military funeral honors, arranged through the funeral home or the cemetery.
• A government headstone, marker or medallion, available for a private cemetery as well as a national one.
• A Presidential Memorial Certificate, which can be requested for more than one family member.
• Bereavement counseling, which VA provides to certain surviving family members.
• An inscription for a spouse or eligible child on the veteran's national cemetery headstone.

None of these is automatic. They are applied for, and the application is much easier while the discharge papers are already on the table.