Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Bloomington Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your grocery store, then it’s possible have gotten a letter of warning from the USDA. The letter is probably a SNAP violation notice, which is stating you have violated the SNAP program. The USDA will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation notice, which will have transactions that occurred at your retail store which the government claims violates one or more genres of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation letter, 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 grocery store’s ability to take EBT.

About The SNAP Program

The SNAP program provides families with get food each month. The SNAP program benefits are given with an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on the card cannot legally be used for general usage, and they cannot be used for cash back services. The EBT cards took the place of food stamps in the 1990’s and are issued by each state individually where the consumer lives. The SNAP program is operated on a nationwide level by the government.

The SNAP program and it’s parameters 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 counts as a SNAP violation

SNAP legal violations occur when a retail store is in violation of the following rules.

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

Your retail store took SNAP funds 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.

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 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 law firm can handle your SNAP violation process in all phases of a SNAP action.

Sending the violation letter is the initial step taken by the USDA to take away your EBT license. This letter may come with no warning and can happen at any time. The violation letter contain details about alleged violations, but most of them will outline serious allegations, with an attachment of details. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. Once 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.

After reviewing the store’s answer to the notice of violation, the USDA might still decide that a violation has occurred. If that happens, the USDA will 100% issue another letter which outlines the governments legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the retail store based on the allegations set forth. Like before, you have 10 days to appeal the decision. If you don’t, you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. After you hire our firm, we file the necessary paperwork to notify the government appeal the decision. We’ll gather necessary evidence, and our team will draft an appellate brief which contains all of the legal laws, legal evidence, etc. which is critical to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to change the legal decision, in the Administrative Review, our lawyers 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. Our attorneys can handle these cases in all 50 states.

SNAP Violations

As a grocery 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, the SNAP program can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limitations. For example, people getting SNAP benefits cant buy electronic goods. If, and when, you violate the laws, you’ll probably get a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can include fines and penalties. If it’s believed you did a major SNAP violation, then you may end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In many situations, owners of grocery stores didn’t even know the violations are even occurring. In many situations, it’s dishonest employees who are misusing the SNAP program. It’s helpful to discuss your case with a SNAP violation lawyer in order to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is presented to your grocery store, you have only 10 days to respond to the claims by the USDA. Failure to respond to the violations will permanently crush your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will generate a verdict even if you don’t respond to the allegations. Without legal experience, you won’t be able to retain EBT benefits. Retaining a SNAP violation lawyer gives you a fighting change. Our SNAP appeals lawyers can discredit the findings of the USDA and fight any penalties. The fines 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 look to see if you have a store compliance policy in place. The policy has to be in writing and the policy must be when the allegations were filed.

The grocery store also be able to prove the above mentioned policy was in existence before the allegations, and wasn’t drafted after the violation was made. The USDA typically also looks in order to check if the grocery store owners benefited from the violations, or if the business owners were aware of the fraud. Any involvement of the management can lead to disqualification.

It’s highly recommended any store that receives a allegation letter consult 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.