Oh boy, buck passing.
Just a suggestion from a former clerk (And small gear in the process): Paperwork is your friend. If you can get anything faxed over (Or in PDF if you lack a fax machine) that has any kind of corroborating evidence at all, even peripherally, it can go a long way.
And never have just one copy. Make three, minimum. And it has to be faxed or PDF-Scanned (At least, in Canada), not just e-mailed. I wouldn't trust the mail, as well, as... Well, it's an old joke because it's true. And is too slow really to confirm that it was sent (They could sit on the issue for months rather than days.).
Not trying to bad mouth the VA or anything, but I've seen and had to deal with offices and the like for many years now, and, at least up here, they're typically like that. My own office was pretty decent, but we were specialized and didn't deal with the public, so the issues that usually crop up with bureaucracies and people didn't happen there. But I had to deal with other offices, and get info to them, and the whole nine yards.
Again, good luck.