Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Tucson Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your grocery store, then may have gotten a official notice from the USDA. The letter is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is claiming you have violated the SNAP program. The government will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation notice, which will contain transactions that occurred at your grocery store that the USDA claims is in violation of one or more genres of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation notice, you should contact our legal team. It’s critical you understand, you only have 10 days to respond. If you don’t respond, the USDA will terminate/suspend your stores ability to accept EBT payments.

About The Program

The SNAP program helps families with get food each month. These benefits are distributed via an EBT card. The benefits on this card cannot be used for general usage, and they cannot be used for fraudulent cash back transactions. The cards took the place of food stamps in the 1990’s and are issued by each state individually where the recipient lives. This program is operated on a national level by the federal government.

This federal and it’s benefits are governed 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 violations occur when a retail store is in violation of the rules below.

The store is accused ofthe trafficking of SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting taking the benefits, or theft of the benefits.

The retail store accepted SNAP funds in exchange for nonfood items like alcohol, tobacco, or other goods.

The store submitted incorrect information on your store’s application to accept EBT benefits.

The grocery store took money for more EBT food stamps than food sales over the same period.

Your employees took SNAP benefits from someone who isn’t allowed to use them.

Defending against a SNAP Violation Letter

Spodek Law Group has experience handling SNAP violations letters. We can handle your SNAP violation process in all phases of a SNAP Violation action.

Sending the letter is the first step which is going to be taken by USDA to take away your EBT license. This letter may come with, or without, prior warnings and can happen at any time. The violation letter contain details about alleged violations, but most letters will mention serious allegations, and have attached documents detailing the violations. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. After you hire our law firm, our lawyers take into their hands 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 SNAP violation letter, the USDA might still decide that your store has violated the rules. If that happens, they’ll will definitely send a second letter which outlines the agencies decision to suspend or disqualify the retail store based on the accusations previously mentioned. Like before, you have 10 days to appeal the verdict. If you choose not to, you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our firm, we’ll file the legal papers to notify the government appeal the decision. Our lawyers collect necessary evidence, and we will draft draft the necessary appeals briefs containing all of the case law, evidence, etc. which is critical to overturn the decision.

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

SNAP Violations

As a food store retailer, there’s a lot of rules and regulations have to obey in order to accept EBT. In most normal situations, many grocery store owners don’t run into problems. However, USDA’s SNAP program can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limitations. For example, SNAP recipients cant get electronic goods. If you violate the laws, you should expect getting a SNAP violation letter. Snap violation penalties can result in severe fines. If it’s believed you did a major SNAP violation, then you may end up with either a permanent or temporary disqualification. In many situations, owners of grocery stores didn’t know the violations are even happening. Often, dishonest employees are misusing the SNAP program. It’s helpful to speak with a SNAP violation lawyer to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is sent to your store, you have only ten days to respond to the claims by the USDA. Your failure to respond will permanently harm your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will generate a verdict even though you don’t respond to the allegations. In the absence of a SNAP violation attorney, you cannot defend your store. Hiring a SNAP violation lawyer gives you a fighting change. Our SNAP appeals lawyers will challenge the decision of the USDA and appeal any decision. The financial penalties imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose does huge fines to curb violations. The USDA will typically look to see if you have a compliance policy in place. It must be in writing at the store and in effect at the time the violations were filed.

The grocery store must be able to prove the compliance policy was in existence before the allegations, and wasn’t drafted after the violation was made. The USDA will also look in order to see if the owners benefited from the violations, or if the business owners were aware of the fraud. If the managers were involved, it can lead to disqualification.

It’s highly recommended any grocery store owner that gets a violation letter speak to with a SNAP violation attorney. Failure can result 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.