Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Downey Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your retail store, then may have been the recipient of a a notice from the USDA. This notice is probably a SNAP violation letter, which is claiming you violated the SNAP program. The government will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation letter, and it will contain transactions which occurred at your store that the government claims is in violation of one or more categories of violations.

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

About The Program

This program provides families with funds to buy food each month. The SNAP program benefits are distributed to consumers via an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on this card aren’t for general usage, and they can’t be used for cash back transactions. The EBT cards took the place of food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued in the state where the recipient lives. The SNAP program is operated on a nationwide level by the federal government.

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

What’s a SNAP Violation

Snap violations happen if and when a retail store violates any of the rules below.

The store is accused oftrafficking SNAP benefits. This can mean fraudulently accepting the benefits, or stealing the benefits.

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

Your store submitted incorrect info on your grocery stores application to accept EBT benefits.

Your store redeemed more EBT food stamps than food sales at the same time.

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

Defending against a SNAP Violation Letter

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

The charging letter is the initial step which is taken by the USDA USDA to take away your EBT license. This letter may come with, or without, prior warnings and can appear at any time. The violation letter will contain allegations, but most letters will outline violations, and have attached documents detailing the violations. You have only 10 days to respond. Once you hire our law firm, we 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 violation letter, the USDA may still believe that a violation has occurred. If that happens, they’ll will issue a second letter that outlines the agencies legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the alleged violations. Like before, you have 10 days to appeal the decision. If you don’t, you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our lawyers, we’ll file the appeal and notify them we are going to appeal their decision. We’ll gather necessary evidence, and we will draft generate an appellate brief containing all of the case law, legal evidence, etc. which is critical to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to change the decision, in the Administrative Review, our lawyers will file a Judicial review at the local Federal District Court. The Judicial Appeal is like a normal case, where you’ll have to do standard processes like discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our attorneys 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 grocery store owners don’t run into problems. However, the 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. As a retailer, if you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can include fines and penalties. If you conduct a serious violation, then you might end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In most cases, store owners didn’t know SNAP violations are even happening. Often, dishonest employees are misusing the SNAP program. It’s helpful to speak with a SNAP violation appeals lawyer in order to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is delivered to your store, you have only 10 days to respond to the claims. Your failure to respond to the violations will permanently crush your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will deliver a verdict even if you choose not to 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 lawyers can discredit the decision of the USDA and appeal any decision. The fines imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose imposes large fines to curb violations. The USDA will look to see if you have a store compliance policy in place. The policy has to be in writing and the policy must be 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 typically also looks to see if the retail store owners benefited from the violations, or were aware of the violation. Any involvement of the management can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any owner that receives a violation 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.