Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Baytown Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your retail store, then it’s possible have been the recipient of a a letter from the USDA. This notification is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is alleging you violated the SNAP program. The USDA will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation letter, which will contain transactions that occurred at your grocery store that the government is saying is in violation of one or more categories of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation notice, you must contact our legal team. It’s critical you understand, you only have 10 days to respond. If you choose to ignore, the USDA will terminate/suspend your stores ability to take EBT.

About The Program

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

The program and the benefits that come with it 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 occur if and when a retail store is in violation of the rules below.

The retail store took part intrafficking SNAP benefits. This can mean fraudulently accepting the benefits, or stealing the benefits.

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

The store submitted incorrect info on the retail stores application to accept EBT benefits.

Your store redeemed more coupons than actual food sales during the same period.

The employees of the store took SNAP benefits from an unauthorized person who isn’t allowed to use the benefits.

How we can help defend you against a SNAP violation notice

Our law firm has experience managing SNAP violations letters. We can handle your SNAP violation process in all phases of a SNAP violation action.

Sending the letter is the initial step taken by the USDA to remove your EBT license. This letter may come with, or without, prior warnings can come at any time. The SNAP violation letter has a variety of allegations, but most of them will outline serious allegations, have evidence attached proving the violations. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. After you hire Spodek Law Group, 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 violation letter, the USDA may still believe that your store has violated the rules. If this happens, they’ll will 100% issue another letter that specifically states the agencies legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the allegations set forth. You have 10 days to appeal this. If you choose not to, then you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. Once you hire our lawyers, we’ll file the appeal to notify the USDA appeal the decision. We’ll collect necessary evidence, and we will draft generate an appellate brief containing all of the legal laws, evidence, etc. which is needed to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to override the legal decision, in the Administrative Review, our lawyers will file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. The Judicial Appeal 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 which you have to adhere to for EBT. In most normal situations, many retail 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, SNAP recipients cant get electronic goods. If 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 serious violation, then you may end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In most cases, owners of grocery stores don’t know the violations were even occurring. Often, dishonest employees are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to speak with a SNAP violation appeals lawyer in order to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is sent to your grocery store, you have only 10 days to respond to the violations. Your failure to respond will permanently crush your store. In addition, 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 fight the findings of the USDA and fight any decision. The penalties imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose chooses to impose huge fines to in order to curb future violations. The USDA look to see if you have a store compliance policy. The policy must be in writing at the store and in effect at the time the allegations were filed.

The retailer must has to be able to prove the above mentioned policy was in place before the charge, and was not drafted after the violation letter. The USDA typically also looks in order to check if the grocery store owners benefited in any way from the fraud, or if the owners were aware of the fraud. If the managers were 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.