DD Form 294 occupies a particular place in Defense recordkeeping. Its title is DD Form 294, Application for a Review by the PDBR of the Rating Awarded Accompanying a Medical Separation from the Armed Forces of the United States, January 2009, and it exists to Application for a Review by the Physical Disability Board of Review (PDBR) of the Rating Awarded Accompanying a Medical Separation from the Armed Forces of the United States. What the DD prefix records is an administrative judgment made long before your copy was printed: this transaction was determined to be common to the whole Department rather than peculiar to one service, and so the documentation of it was standardized at Department level.
The practical effect of Department-level issue is interoperability. not stated establishes the requirement across the Defense enterprise; not stated keeps the document current for all of it. No service maintains its own variant, which means a completed record travels between components — service to agency, agency to joint command — and arrives in a format the receiving office already knows how to read.
Current edition: not stated, status not stated. Understand why that date is worth attention here. When the Department reissues a form, the replacement takes effect across every component simultaneously, so an older copy is not merely locally out of date — it is out of date in every office that might receive it.
Work down the page in the printed order, and understand why the order exists. The identifying block establishes whose record this is and under what circumstances it arises. The body of the form then answers questions that are only meaningful once that context is fixed. The signature block comes last because a certification signed before the entries are complete certifies nothing.
Before the first entry, compare the date printed on the form face with not stated. This is not bureaucratic fussiness. Editions change field numbering, and a receiving office working from the current layout may look for information where your copy does not put it. On a Department form the exposure is wider than usual: your record may be reviewed by an office in another service entirely, one with no reason to remember what the previous edition looked like.
For an ambiguous field, read the form's own instruction, then not stated, which controls.
Download the form
What you can download: PDF. The form runs 3 pages and asks for approximately 30 entries.
Nothing here is charged for. Published Defense forms are public documents and distribution carries no fee, in any format. One caution about software: fill the form in a desktop pdf application rather than a browser tab. Browser-embedded viewers implement field behaviour inconsistently, and the failure mode is silent loss of everything you entered.
What the form asks for
- 1. Applicant data. a. Branch of Service. Press space bar to mark X in first box if Army, second box if Marine Corps, third box if Navy, fourth box if Air Force, or fifth box if Coast Guard.
- b. Name while serving (last, first, middle initial). If name has changed, enter "AKA", then current name.
- c. Pay grade at time of separation.
- d. Date of separation (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- e. Social security number.
- 2. Final disability rating awarded by service for unfitting condition. X first box if 0 percent, second box if 10 percent, or third box if 20 percent.
- 3. Issues why the rating for the condition which rendered the member unfit should be changed (continue in item 12 if necessary).
- 4. In support of this application, the following documents are submitted as evidence (continue in item 13 if necessary).
- 5. VA rating information. a. I have received a VA disability rating that includes the condition for which I was found unfit. X first box if yes, second box if no, third box if not applicable, or fourth box if pending.
- b. I have attached my VA determination letter (N/A if 5.a. is no or pending). X first box if yes, second box if no, third box if not applicable.
- 6. VA consent. X first box if do, or second box if do not, freely authorize the VA to release information to PDBR.
- 7.a. Counsel/Representative (if any). Name (last, first, middle initial) and Address (see Item 7 of the Instructions).
- b. Telephone number (include area code).
- c. E-mail address.
- d. Fax number (include area code).
- 8. Applicant must sign in item 11.a. below. If the record in question is that of a deceased or incompetent person, legal proof of death or incompetency must accompany the application. If the application is signed by other than the applicant, print the name:
- If signed by other than applicant, indicate relationship: X first box if spouse, second box if widow, third box if widower, fourth box if next of kin, fifth box if legal representative, or sixth box if other.
- Specify other relationship.
- 9.a. Current address of applicant or person in item 8 above (forward notification of any change in address.
- b. Telephone number (include area code).
- c. Cell phone number (include area code).
- d. E-mail address.
- 11. Certification. a. Signature - Required. Applicant or person in Item 8 above.
- b. Date signed (current date).
Route the executed form as not stated or local guidance directs, and retain a duplicate first. Cross-component routing is ordinary for DD forms, which is precisely why a personal copy earns its keep: the receiving office may belong to an organization you have no standing to query about a missing document.
Cross-referenced documents are found by series and number, with nothing further required. That the DD sequence is unified across the Department means a cited number identifies one form and no other, which is the practical payoff of centralizing the numbering in the first place.
Procedures that touch both Department and service processes will cite forms from both sequences, and the coincidence of numbers between them is exactly that — coincidence. An Army proponent maintains the DA series for the Army; not stated or another Department office maintains the DD series for the whole Department. Two independent registries, two independent numbering runs, no correspondence at any value.
A form is downstream of the policy that requires it, and revision usually starts there: a directive is reissued, a collection requirement is altered, notice language is updated by statute. The form is republished as a consequence. Since none of that reaches individual users, an archived copy quietly becomes wrong, and verifying not stated each time you download is the whole remedy.
The role of this page is narrow and worth stating plainly. It makes a published Defense form available and explains its structure. It does not advise, does not interpret policy for your circumstances, and cannot indicate how any office will treat a completed copy — those judgments rest with the authorities that own the process. Direct such questions to not stated, to the administrative office that services you, or to the authority named in not stated.
Questions and answers
- What is DD Form 294?
- DD Form 294, Application for a Review by the PDBR of the Rating Awarded Accompanying a Medical Separation from the Armed Forces of the United States, January 2009
- Which edition is current?
- Not stated by the publisher
- Who is responsible for this form?
- Not stated
- In which formats can it be downloaded?