Oh man this does not give me high hopes at all. From what I had heard it takes a while to get your first month and then after that they should come in smoothly. I hope it gets figured out for you and quick!!
My .02 is that the VA will not pay for both at the same time. Now if you went to a college that was cheap enough and you still got your benefits at full time rate, like for me would be 1471/mo, and your school only costs 1000/semester then you would make out and could use that extra money for flying.
But I could be wrong and will have to wait for your answer that you hopefully post after you call the 800 #
Juan-I have been using the VA for flight training oh for about nine months now at 2 different schools.
Here's what you're going to see when you try and use your benefits. Once all the paperwork has been straightened out between you and the school (this can sometimes be a long process) you will begin receiving your reimbursements one of two ways...
1-The monthly certification goes through without a hitch and you receive your reimbursement two weeks into the following month (i.e. your school sends March's summary sheet on April 1st) you can receive it as quickly as, oh about the 14th of April (very unlikely)
2-The monthly certification gets sent by your school directly to the VA (usually the schools I've worked with have done a good job at doing this in an expeditious manner) and the VA throws it into the "do not ever look in this stack of papers, especially for paperwork that is extremely late or missing".
Now option 2 is usually what's going to happen and you have to track everything down yourself. Latest instance, I started training with a school here in Texas. I just finished up my PPL and instrument at a school in Hawaii. Upon completion of the course and knowing that I was going to have to send the VA paperwork about the school change I took the initiative to figure out what paperwork they would need and submit it online. Did that back in Dec 08. Got my new school all the paperwork they needed and all that and they sent it to the VA. Jan 8th I started training.
VA sends me something saying something that the paperwork is messed up and that I'm still enrolled in Hawaii. Get that figured out somehow. Now mid-end February rolls around....no payment. Call the VA....ummmmm sorry sir we dont have paperwork xyz. Get my school to resubmit xyz. Mid march rolls around still no payment, call VA. Okay sir ummm well it's going to be approximately 16 weeks for your payment (what? are you kidding me...that will be 7 months after the first month I started training). Talk to supervisors and whatnot....get my January reimbursment right about the 1st of April.
Now I'm waiting on February and March and I have spent my "allotted" money for my training (17k) and now I have to start using my savings account because I haven't gotten any of the payments I planned on dumping back into the training.
Good luck Juan. Sometimes the payments are painless and quick, but if the paperwork goes into that aforementioned stack of papers...you'll be waiting a while.
My instructor said he got too fed up with the VA and stopped using his benefits for flight training. I on the otherhand realize how expensive training is, and even though it's a pain in the ass the work is well worth it. Any help is better than no help.