Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Placentia Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your grocery store, then may have been the recipient of a a official notice from the USDA. This notice is probably a SNAP violation letter, which is stating you violated the SNAP program. The USDA will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation notice, and it will have transactions which happened at your grocery store that the government is saying violates one or more groups of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation notice, you should definitely contact our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you choose to ignore, the USDA will suspend your grocery store’s ability to take EBT.

About The Program

This program helps families with funds to buy food each month. The SNAP program benefits are distributed via an EBT card. The funds on the EBT card are not for general use, and they cannot be used for cash back transactions. The EBT cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued in the state where the consumer lives. The program is operated on a nationwide level by the government.

The 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 when a grocery store is in violation of the following rules.

The store was involved inthe trafficking of SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting the benefits, or stealing the benefits.

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

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

Your grocery store took money for more coupons than food sales at the same time.

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

How we can help defend you against a SNAP violation notice

Our law firm has experience managing SNAP violation 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 take away your right to take EBT benefits. The letter can come with, or without, prior warnings and can appear at any time. The SNAP violation letter contain details about alleged violations, but most letters will lay out violations, and have attached documents detailing the violations. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. 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 SNAP violation letter, the USDA may still feel that your store has violated the rules. If that happens, they’ll will definitely send a second letter which outlines the agencies legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the 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 stuck with the USDA decision. After you hire our firm, we’ll file the legal papers to notify them appeal the decision. Our lawyers collect necessary evidence, and our team will generate an appellate brief which contains all of the case law, legal evidence, etc. which is needed to change the outcome of the violations.

If the USDA refuses to change the legal decision, in the Administrative Review, we’ll 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. We can handle these cases in all 50 states.

SNAP Violations

As a food store retailer, there’s a lot of rules and regulations which you have to adhere to for EBT. In most cases, 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 get electronic goods. If you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Snap violation penalties 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 didn’t even know the violations were even occurring. Often, unethical employees are misusing the SNAP program. It’s helpful to discuss your case with a SNAP violation attorney to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is delivered to your grocery store, you have only ten days to respond to the violations. 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. Without legal experience, you cannot defend your store. Retaining a SNAP violation lawyer gives you the ability to fight for your rights. Our SNAP appeals lawyers will discredit 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 purposefully does huge fines to curb violations. The USDA look to see if you have a store compliance policy. It must be in writing at the store and in effect at the time the violations were filed.

The grocery store also has to be able to prove the compliance policy was in place before the charge, and was not drafted after the violation letter. The USDA typically also looks to see if the owners benefited from the violations, or if the owners were aware of the fraud. If the managers were involved, it can lead to disqualification.

It’s highly recommended any owner that gets a allegation 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.