When the VCF has made an award determination for your claim, you will receive a letter notifying you of the amount of your award. Please read this letter carefully. If there is any outstanding missing information on your claim, it will be listed in this letter. This information must be provided before the VCF can begin processing your payment.
Your award letter will include the estimated timing for your payment to be processed. The VCF starts processing your payment one business day after the date of the award letter. Once the VCF begins processing the payment, it may take up to 20 days for the Special Master to authorize the payment. The payment then gets processed by the Department of Justice and the Treasury Department, which may take up to three weeks. This means your payment should be issued to the designated bank account within two months from the date of your award letter. This is a general estimate, and your payment may be processed earlier.
All VCF payments are made electronically by direct deposit to a regular checking or savings account. Payments cannot be made to money market or brokerage accounts.
Payment will be made via an electronic deposit directly to a regular checking or savings account. Payments will be made by the U.S. Department of the Treasury using the Automated Clearing House (“ACH”) electronic payment system.
You will need to complete the “VCF ACH Payment Information Form.” You can download the form or you can call the toll-free Helpline and request a paper form be mailed to you. Complete the form by carefully following the instructions provided with the form, and upload the completed form to your online claim. Note that you must complete and sign Section 1 of the form and a representative from your bank must complete and sign Section 3. The VCF requires that a bank representative sign the ACH form to verify that the bank routing number and your account number are correct. Any missing or incorrect information will delay payment on your claim.
If you use an online bank, please contact your bank and ask about options for mailing or faxing the form to them. Your bank can also download a blank form and complete it on your behalf. You can work with your bank to determine the best way to complete the form. Please remember that a representative from the online bank must sign the form to validate the account information. Once the ACH form is complete, upload the form directly to your online claim.
Payment will be made via an electronic deposit to a regular checking or savings account. Payments will be made by the U.S. Department of the Treasury using Automated Clearing House (“ACH”) electronic payment system.
You will need to complete the “VCF International ACH Payment Information Form.” You can download the form which includes directions for completing it, or you can call the toll-free Helpline and request a paper form be mailed to you. Complete the form by carefully following the instructions provided with the form, and upload the completed form to your online claim. Note that you must complete and sign Section 1 of the form and a representative from your bank must complete and sign Section 3. The VCF requires that a bank representative sign the ACH form to verify that the bank routing number and your account number are correct. Any missing or incorrect information will delay payment on your claim.
If you use an online bank, please contact your bank and ask about options for mailing or faxing the form to them. Your bank can also download a blank form from the VCF website and complete it on your behalf. You can work with your bank to determine the best way to complete the form. Please remember that a representative from the online bank must sign the form to validate the account information. Once the form is complete, upload the form directly to your online claim.
Many law firms that represent VCF claimants have an agreement with their clients that VCF payments will be made directly to the law firm escrow account on behalf of the claimant. The VCF expects that the law firm will disburse the payment to you within 30 days of the money being deposited into the law firm account.
If you are represented by an attorney and payment on your claim will be made to the law firm’s escrow account, your attorney will ask that you sign a VCF Client Authorization Form allowing the VCF to issue your payment to that account. The VCF requires that you sign the Client Authorization with an original signature and your law firm is required to maintain the original, signed document in their files. Your law firm will upload a copy of the completed form to your claim.
For Law Firms: please carefully review the “Law Firm Payment Instructions,” also available on the “Information for Law Firms” page of the VCF website, if your law firm has an agreement with the claimants you represent that VCF payments will be made directly to a bank account maintained by the law firm to hold and distribute proceeds obtained on behalf of clients of the firm. You must follow the specific instructions or payment may be delayed.
The online claims system includes functionality to generate a pre-populated PDF version of the VCF Client Authorization Form for each claim. When generating the form from within a claim in the online system, it will be pre-populated with data pulled directly from the individual claim. Effective December 1, 2022, the only version of the form that should be used by law firms is the version generated from the online claims system. The form can be generated, completed, printed, signed, and uploaded to the claim. Your law firm must carefully follow the instructions in order for the VCF to accept the completed authorization, including attesting to the accuracy of the information on the form, and maintaining an original copy of the form with the client’s original signature. The attorney representing the claim must also complete and sign Section IV of the form. The completed form should be uploaded directly to the claim in the online system. The complete instructions are included with the system-generated form.
Each payment made to a law firm bank account includes the claimant name and claim number as part of the transaction record. You may need to ask your bank to provide this information to you if it is not easily visible as part of the transaction detail. Payments for multiple individuals will not be grouped into a single transaction, although your law firm may receive more than one deposit on the same day. Your financial institution should provide the details to you for each deposit made to your account.
If you submitted a “VCF ACH Payment Information Form” and then changed your bank account, you will need to submit a new form (available on the VCF website) so the VCF has the current banking information for any future payments on your claim. Carefully follow the directions on the form and upload the new form to your online claim with a letter stating that it should replace the banking information currently associated with your claim.
If you submitted documents directing the VCF to pay your claim through your attorney, that instruction may not be changed once your claim moves to “Special Master Review” status in the online system. You may still remove or change the attorney associated with your claim for any future appeal or amendment. If your award is changed by that amendment or appeal and you submit new payment instructions, then the new payment instructions will apply to the payment resulting from the amendment or appeal and all subsequent payments. If you previously authorized the VCF to make the payment on your claim to an attorney and you remove the attorney from your claim, you must complete the “Change of Attorney Form” and submit the signed form to the VCF in order for the change to be made to your claim. Claimants should be aware that, regardless of how they receive payment from the VCF, they may continue to be liable for any agreement related to attorney fees as specified in the attorney-claimant contract.
The VCF will issue payment on behalf of a deceased victim to the Personal Representative of the deceased individual. The Personal Representative, however, is not necessarily the person who will ultimately receive the award. This depends on the specific circumstances of the claim, the domicile of the decedent, applicable state law, the terms of the decedent’s will or other terms governing the distribution of the decedent’s estate, and/or any applicable rulings made by a court of competent jurisdiction. The Personal Representative is required to distribute the award in accordance with the law of the victim’s domicile.
If more than one individual has been appointed as co-Personal Representatives, please see Section 6.5 for important information about the documentation that is needed in order for the VCF to process the payment on the claim.
The Special Master will not split a VCF payment among multiple payees. For example, the VCF will not split a payment so a portion is paid directly to a law firm and a portion directly to the claimant. Attorneys who represent VCF claimants should have agreements in place with their clients that include details on the fees being charged and how and when those fees will be paid. Payments made by the VCF are paid only to injured victims or the authorized Personal Representative of a deceased victim, or the court-appointed guardian of an incapacitated adult. Although the Special Master will authorize payment to a law firm account with appropriate documentation signed by the claimant, the payment is made specifically on behalf of the individual.
On November 21, 2019, Congress passed the USVSST Fund Clarification Act, which allows 9/11 victims, widows, and dependents – as specifically defined by the Clarification Act – to receive USVSST Fund payments, even if they had already applied for or received compensation from the VCF.
This is a legislative reversal of the prior statutory language under which some of these claimants would not be compensated by the USVSST Fund if they were simultaneously pursuing a VCF claim.
The VCF is required by law to offset any benefit paid by other collateral sources relating to the 9/11 attacks. As a result, USVSST Fund payments made to victims who are also eligible for compensation from the VCF, will be subject to offset by the VCF. The VCF is required to offset USVSST Fund payments made on account of 9/11-related injuries to the same victim. If the VCF victim and the USVSST Fund claimant are not the same person (e.g., the USVSST Fund claim is because of a judgment entered for damages arising from the death of a spouse, parent, or sibling, even if the claimant is the same person), the VCF is not required to take an offset.