Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Montgomery Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your retail store, then may have received a official warning from the USDA. The notice is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is stating you have violated the SNAP program. The USDA will include proof to the SNAP violation notice, which will have transactions which happened at your retail store which the government is saying violates one or more groups of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation letter, you should definitely contact our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you choose to ignore, the government will terminate/suspend your stores ability to take EBT.

About The SNAP Program

This program helps families with a certain amount of money each month. The SNAP program benefits are given via an EBT card. The benefits on this card are not for general usage, and they can’t be used for fraudulent cash back services. The EBT cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and are issued by each state individually where the consumer lives. The program is run on a national level by the federal government.

This government and it’s parameters are under handled by the US Code and the Code of Federal Regulations. The USDA FNS agency enforces the regulations and runs the program.

What does it mean to have a SNAP violation

SNAP legal violations occur if and when a grocery store violates any of the following rules.

The grocery store is accused oftrafficking SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting the benefits, or theft of the benefits.

Your grocery store took SNAP benefits in exchange for nonfood items like alcohol, tobacco, or other goods.

Your store submitted false information on the grocery stores application to accept EBT benefits.

The store redeemed more EBT food stamps than sale of actual food over the same period.

The employees of the store took SNAP benefits from someone who shouldn’t be allowed to use the benefits.

How we can help defend you against a SNAP violation notice

Spodek Law Group has immense experience handling SNAP violation letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP violation process in all 3 phases of a SNAP action.

The charging letter is the first step which is going to be taken by USDA to take away your right to take EBT benefits. The letter can come with, or without, prior warnings and can happen at any time. The charging letter will have allegations in it, but most of them will mention violations, have evidence attached proving the violations. You have only 10 days to respond. Once you hire our law firm, our lawyers handle all of the communicationswith the USDA and for compiling all the necessary evidence, and drafting a response to the USDA.

Once the USDA reviews your answer to the notice of violation, the USDA may still decide that your store has violated the rules. If that happens, they’ll will definitely send another letter that outlines their legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the accusations previously mentioned. Like before, you have 10 days to appeal this verdict. If you choose not to, then you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. Once you hire our law firm, we file the appeal to notify the government appeal the decision. We’ll collect necessary evidence, and our team will draft the necessary appeals briefs which contains all of the legal laws, legal evidence, etc. which is critical to change the outcome of the violations.

In the event the USDA refuses to overturn the binding decision, in the Administrative Review, we will file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. This process is like a normal court case, where you’ll be able to do discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our lawyers can handle these cases in all 50 states.

SNAP Violations

As a grocery store retailer, there are many laws have to obey in order to accept EBT. In most normal situations, many retail store owners don’t run into problems. However, USDA’s SNAP program can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limits on how the funds can be used. For example, people getting SNAP benefits cant get electronic goods. If you violate the laws, you should expect getting a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can result in fines, and penalties. If it’s believed you did a serious violation, then you might end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In many situations, store owners didn’t know SNAP violations were even occurring. In many situations, unethical employees are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to consult with a SNAP violation appeals lawyer to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is presented to your store, you have only 10 days to respond to the allegations. Failure to respond to the allegations will permanently crush your store. In addition, the USDA will generate a verdict even if you don’t respond to the allegations. In the absence of a SNAP violation attorney, you won’t be able to retain EBT benefits. Retaining a SNAP violation lawyer gives you a fighting change. Our SNAP appeals lawyers will fight the decision of the USDA and fight any penalties. The penalties imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA purposefully chooses to impose huge fines to curb violations. The USDA will typically look to see if you have a compliance policy in place. The policy must be in writing and in effect at the time the allegations were filed.

The grocery store also has to be able to prove the above mentioned policy was in existence before the allegations, and was not drafted after the violation letter. The USDA typically also looks in order to see if the retail store owners benefited in any way from the fraud, or if the owners were aware of the fraud. If the management was involved it can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any store owner that gets a letter speak to with a SNAP violation attorney. Choosing not to respond in negative consequences. The USDA is required by Congress to issue a disqualification for a period of up to 5 years. This can result in huge losses which are hard to recover from.