Terms of Use

These terms are written in plain language on purpose.

Where a plain sentence and a legal sentence could say the same thing, I chose the plain one.

Using the site means you accept these terms and the Privacy Policy, which is part of them.

If you do not accept them, please do not use the site.

Veteran Benefits GPS™ is a free navigation guide for Veterans and their families on the website at vbgps.org, operated by Veteran Benefits GPS LLC, an Illinois limited liability company.

In these terms, "I", "me", and "my" mean Veteran Benefits GPS LLC.

"The site" means the website at vbgps.org and everything it shows you.

"The tool" means the navigation guide itself: its front door, its map, and everything inside them.

"You" means the person using the site.

The tool gives general information and links: it shows where you are in the benefits process and points you to the official starting place for each step, the form number where a form applies, and the official links.

It does not act for you.

It points.

Illinois law (815 Illinois Compiled Statutes (ILCS) 505/2YYY) asks anyone who provides Veteran or military benefits services in exchange for anything of value to give two statements in upper case.

The tool is free and gives general information and links, not those services, but both statements are true, so I carry them here and on the About page:

THIS BUSINESS IS NOT ENDORSED OR SPONSORED BY, OR AFFILIATED WITH, THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS OR THE ILLINOIS DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS, OR ANY FEDERALLY CHARTERED VA ACCREDITED VETERAN SERVICE ORGANIZATION.

YOU MAY QUALIFY FOR OTHER VETERANS BENEFITS BEYOND THE BENEFITS FOR WHICH YOU ARE RECEIVING SERVICES HERE.

VETERAN AND MILITARY BENEFITS SERVICES ARE AVAILABLE FREE OF CHARGE FROM VA ACCREDITED COUNTY VETERAN SERVICE OFFICERS, REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ILLINOIS DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND THE VETERAN SERVICE OFFICERS OF FEDERALLY CHARTERED VETERAN SERVICE ORGANIZATIONS.

TO LEARN MORE, CONTACT THESE ORGANIZATIONS OR THE ILLINOIS ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE AT 1-800-382-3000.

Rules, forms, deadlines, and dollar amounts change.

Every route in the tool ends at an official page, and that page is the authority, not this tool.

If the tool and the official page ever disagree, the official page is right, and I would like to hear about it at casey@vbgps.org so I can fix the tool.

There is no fee to use the tool, no upsell inside it, and nothing you have to give me to use it.

The tool offers an account from November 11, 2026.

It is optional and it is free.

No territory, no step, and no other content in the tool sits behind it, and an account buys no speed and no place in any line.

You get the same content signed out as signed in, and you never have to give me an email address to see any of the site's content.

No Veteran pays anything to use the tool, ever.

The work may be funded by sponsorships, contributions from supporters, grants, prizes, contracts, licensing, and services in kind, and none of it comes from charging a Veteran.

If you choose to contribute, the Supporter Terms govern your contribution.

On the tool's screens a sponsor is credited in two places only, by name, tier, and logo: the sponsor strip, one slim row at the foot of each screen and on the landing page, labeled "Sponsors" so you never have to guess what it is; and the foot of the Route Pass, the picture and link of your route that you can make in the tool to save or share, where the first sponsor the strip lists is named, with its tier and logo, and that credit stays on the picture.

The strip lists national sponsors first, then the state, region, and county sponsors that match the county you pick on your own device, if you pick one; when no sponsor serves the county you pick, or you do not pick one, it lists every sponsor in turn.

I never learn which county you pick.

A tap on a logo opens that sponsor's tile on the Sponsored By page and never the sponsor's own site.

The Sponsored By page shows each sponsor's name and link.

No sponsor appears anywhere in the tool's guidance: not in any territory's orientation, steps, or glossary, and not among the official pages the tool points to.

None of this changes the guidance the tool shows anyone or the order it comes in, and, apart from your name on the Supported By page when you ask for it, no sponsor or supporter ever receives anything about you from me.

The Privacy Policy says that in detail.

When this section applies.

From the day the tool offers you an account (November 11, 2026, for everyone), and only to you if you make one.

The account is optional, and the tool works completely without it.

What it takes.

An email address and nothing else.

You type your email address, I send a single-use link that expires in fifteen minutes, you click it, and you are signed in.

There is no password to create, remember, or reset, because the tool never makes one.

An account is not for anyone under eighteen.

What you agree to when you make one.

That the email address is yours, that it is accurate, and that you accept these terms and the Privacy Policy.

You accept them by checking the box beside the sign-in control, and I record the date and time you did it and which version of these terms you accepted.

The account is yours to use, not to hand around: a sign-in link sent to your address gets into your account, so treat it the way you would treat anything else that opens a door.

If you lose control of the email address, write to me at casey@vbgps.org.

Changing your email address.

You can change it without deleting the account and without losing your journey.

I send a link to the new address, and the new address replaces the old one only after you click that link.

Email.

An account brings only this email: the sign-in links you ask for; a link to confirm a new address when you change it; one warning before an unused account is deleted; any notice these terms or the Privacy Policy promise you, such as the one section 14 gives before the site and the tool pass to a successor; and product updates and check-ins, if you turn them on, which one click turns off without touching anything else on this list.

What is stored against it.

Your email address, the navigation state the tool already keeps, the dates the account was created and last used, the date and time you accepted these terms and which version you accepted, whether you turned on product updates and check-ins, and a scrambled fingerprint of each short-lived sign-in link.

Nothing else.

The Privacy Policy carries the full list, and it is exhaustive.

What happens when you sign in.

If your account has nothing saved in it, the progress in your browser is copied up and nothing is lost.

If your browser and your account hold different progress when you sign in, I show you both and you choose.

While you are signed in, a change on one device reaches the other; where one copy holds everything the other does and more, the fuller copy is kept, and where each holds something the other lacks, I show you both and you choose.

Nothing is merged behind your back, and no progress is dropped without your choice.

How it ends.

You can delete the account from inside the tool at any time, and everything stored against it is gone from the tool the moment you do it; if the service that stores accounts keeps a short safety backup, the account leaves it when that backup ages out and is never restored from it.

If an account is not signed in to or used for twenty-four months, I delete it, and I send a warning email thirty days before I do, so you can keep it by signing in once.

I can also close and delete an account used to break section 5.

You may use the tool to navigate your own benefits and to help a Veteran or family member with theirs.

You may share links to it, and your own Route Pass, freely.

You may not copy the site's content, structure, route logic, or design to build a competing product; sell or license any part of the site; scrape it with automated tools, other than a search engine indexing it; remove any notice on it; try to get into an account that is not yours or to disrupt the site or the systems it runs on; or use my name or marks in a way that suggests that I endorse you or that you are me.

Government agencies, Veterans Service Organizations, and accredited representatives are welcome to point their Veterans to the tool; write to me if you want anything more than a link.

Apart from what the rest of this section names, the text, structure, routes, graphics, and design of the site and the tool are the property of Veteran Benefits GPS LLC and are protected by United States copyright law as far as that law reaches them.

Copyright 2026 Veteran Benefits GPS LLC.

All rights reserved.

Veteran Benefits GPS and the compass mark are trademarks of Veteran Benefits GPS LLC.

Official forms, agency names, agency content that the tool points to, and statute text the site quotes come from the bodies that publish them; sponsors' names and logos belong to the sponsors; other companies' names and logos belong to those companies; and typefaces and icons licensed from others belong to their makers.

I claim no ownership of any of them.

With no account, the tool keeps your navigation state on your own device, in your own browser, and it never sends that state to me or to anyone; only you can send your route, as a Route Pass.

The tool offers an optional account from November 11, 2026.

If you make one, it stores the same navigation state on my side as well, alongside your email address, so your place follows you between devices.

None of it is shared with anyone except the companies that host the site, host the account, and deliver its email, which handle it only to do that; the Privacy Policy names them.

Beyond them, it goes only to an accountant or lawyer I engage, who must keep it confidential; to a successor, if you agree to the move, as section 14 describes; and to anyone a court order or a law compels me to answer, which the Privacy Policy covers.

The Route Pass keeps your route in its own link, in a part of the address your browser never sends to a server, and the pass never sends your route to me.

It carries nothing about who you are, and anyone you give the link, the picture, or its quick-response (QR) code to can open the same route.

Signed in or not, the tool never stores a medical condition, a disability rating, or any detail of a claim, and there is no place in it to type or upload one.

The short questions at the front door touch some of these subjects in general terms, only to pick where you start and which of the map's filters start out on, and your answers stay on your device and are never stored.

The tool never asks for your name either; if you contribute, the Supporter Terms say what I keep.

The Privacy Policy describes exactly what the tool stores, what it never collects, what else you may choose to give me through the site and what happens to it, what the hosting provider sees when it serves the pages, and how to erase what is stored.

That policy is part of these terms.

The site, the tool included, is provided as it is and as it is available.

I work to keep it accurate and current, and I check it against official sources, but I cannot promise that it is complete, current, or error-free, or that it will always be available.

To the fullest extent the law allows, I disclaim every warranty, express or implied, including any implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Nothing in this section limits any right you have under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act or any other law that cannot be waived.

Nothing in this section takes back any promise made in these terms or the Privacy Policy, including what the tool stores, shares, or deletes.

The tool is free and it only points.

To the fullest extent the law allows, Veteran Benefits GPS LLC is not liable for any indirect, incidental, consequential, or special loss arising from your use of the site or your reliance on it, including any loss from a missed deadline, a denied claim, a lost benefit, or a decision you made.

If a court finds that I am liable to you despite this section, my total liability for all claims together is limited to one hundred dollars.

Some laws do not allow these limits; where such a law applies, my liability is limited to the smallest amount that law allows.

Nothing in this section limits any right you have under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act or any other law that cannot be waived, or limits liability for fraud or for willful and wanton conduct.

Nothing in this section takes back any promise made in these terms or the Privacy Policy, including what the tool stores, shares, or deletes.

Almost every link in the tool's guidance opens a VA.gov page, and the rest open another federal agency's page (the Defense Finance and Accounting Service, the Office of Personnel Management, or the Small Business Administration), the page of the VA's Office of Inspector General, or the Veterans Crisis Line.

On the State and Local Benefits territory, once you choose a state, the tool links to that state's own official pages, such as its Veterans agency, and, for a local program, to the official page of the local public body that runs it; where the tool has not confirmed that state's own page for a step, it says so and links instead to the VA's directory of state Veterans agencies, the Disabled American Veterans' office finder, and the pages of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate for finding your members of Congress; it never stores or sends the state you choose.

I have no agreement with any of these agencies or organizations about these links, and none of them pays me for them.

Outside the guidance, the site also links to my own profiles on other platforms; the Sponsored By page can link to a sponsor's own site, and a logo in the sponsor strip opens that page and not the sponsor's site; and the support page links to Stripe's own payment page, where a contribution is made.

Each of these sites has its own terms and privacy practices, which I do not control.

I may change the site, the tool, and these terms.

When I change these terms, I will change the date at the top and, for a change that matters, post a notice on the site for thirty days before the change takes effect.

Using the site after a change takes effect means the changed terms apply.

If you have an account, the tool asks you to accept a changed version that matters before you use the account again, and records it the way section 4A says.

If you do not accept it, you can still see, download, and delete everything stored against the account.

A change never reaches back to anything that happened before it took effect.

If I ever change what an account stores, the Privacy Policy changes first and says so plainly.

You can stop using the site at any time; if you never made an account, erasing your browser's storage for vbgps.org removes everything the tool kept in that browser.

If you have an account, delete it from inside the tool and everything stored against it is gone from the tool immediately; clearing your browser storage as well removes the copy sitting on that device.

A Route Pass you already shared stays with the people you shared it with.

I can restrict or end access for anyone who breaks section 5.

Sections 6, 8, 9, 13, and 14 keep applying after you stop using the site or delete an account, and sections 4A and 7 keep applying for as long as anything they describe is still stored.

These terms are governed by Illinois law.

If something goes wrong, write to me at casey@vbgps.org, and I will try to put it right within thirty days.

These terms and the Privacy Policy are the whole agreement between you and me about using the site.

A contribution is governed by the Supporter Terms, and anything else you sign with me is governed by what you signed; where either differs from these terms, it governs.

If part of these terms is unenforceable, the rest stays in force.

If I do not enforce a term once, I can still enforce it later.

You may not assign these terms; I may assign them to a successor that takes over the site and the tool, and I will say so on the site, and by email to every account holder, at least thirty days before the site and the tool pass to the successor.

No account, and nothing stored against one, goes to a successor unless its holder agrees; every other account is deleted, and kept out of any backup that passes, before the site and the tool pass to the successor.

A sale or merger of Veteran Benefits GPS LLC itself counts as passing the site and the tool to a successor under this section.

Veteran Benefits GPS LLC · casey@vbgps.org · PO Box 2, Herod, IL 62947