The VA Benefits Transparency Index: how we score it.

The Index scores the transparency of the VA benefits system, not the generosity or correctness of its decisions. A surface can decide claims well and still be scored poorly for hiding how, and the reverse. Scoring transparency separately keeps the Index factual: every score must rest on observable, citable evidence about what VA does or does not publish.

The first edition scores a defined set of surfaces rather than the department in the abstract. The frozen surface list for 2026: claims processing statistics, the automated claims pipeline, the rating schedule and its changes, paperwork burden estimates, FOIA administration, accreditation records, appeals and Board statistics, and official guidance pages. The surface list was fixed and published before scoring began and does not change during a scoring cycle.

A surface's score is the weighted sum of its dimension scores, normalized to 100, and maps to a descriptive transparency tier: Fully transparent for 85 and above, Mostly transparent for 70 to 84, Partial for 55 to 69, Limited for 35 to 54, and Opaque below 35. The tiers describe what the public can see and verify; they are not letter grades and not a judgment of VA's decisions. The Index publishes no single composite score for the department: eight surfaces measured separately do not compress honestly into one number. No tier is published without its full worksheet, and every surface lists the specific artifacts VA could publish that would raise its score.

Evidence rules. Every dimension score must cite specific, dated, publicly checkable evidence: a URL, a document, a FOIA response, or an archived capture. Absence of evidence scores as absence of transparency, but only after a documented good-faith search that the worksheet describes. Where the Desk's own records supply the evidence (for example, FOIA response timelines), the underlying records are published with the edition. If VA publishes something we could not find, the score is corrected and the correction logged.

What the Index will not do. It will not score individual VA employees, will not treat a lawful denial or a means test as a transparency failure, and will not convert disagreement with policy into a low score. It measures whether the public can see and verify what the system is doing, nothing else.

The Index is annual. Each edition names the scoring window, freezes the rubric version used, and links the prior editions so movement is visible year over year. Changes to this methodology are versioned and dated on this page; scores are never recomputed retroactively under a new rubric.

Independence. The Desk takes no funding from VA, from claims agents or law firms it might score-adjacent content about, and its sponsorship policy bars sponsors from influencing editorial content. VA will be offered the opportunity to comment on its scores before each edition publishes, and any response received will be published alongside the edition.