Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Mishawaka Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your grocery store, then it’s possible have gotten a letter of warning from the USDA. This notification is probably a SNAP violation notice, which is stating 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 retail store which the government is saying violates one or more groups of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation notice, you should contact our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you don’t respond, the USDA will suspend your grocery store’s ability to take EBT.

About The Program

This program helps families with a certain amount of money each month. The SNAP program benefits are distributed to consumers through an EBT card. The funds on the EBT card are not for general use, and they cannot be used for cash back transactions. The cards took the place of food stamps in the 1990’s and are issued in the state where the consumer lives. This program is run on a national level by the federal government.

This federal and the benefits that come with it are governed by the US 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 happen if and when a 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 theft of the benefits.

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

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

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

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

How to defend your store against a SNAP violation

Our law firm has immense experience handling SNAP violation letters. Our law firm can handle your SNAP Violation appeal in all 3 phases of a SNAP violation action.

Sending the letter is the first step which is taken by the USDA USDA to take away your EBT license. The letter can come with no warning and can appear at any time. The violation letter has a variety of allegations, but most of them will lay out 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 notice of violation, the USDA may still believe that your store has violated the rules. If this happens, they’ll will 100% issue another letter which specifically states the agencies legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the retail store based on the allegations set forth. Like before, you have ten days to appeal this decision. If you don’t, you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our lawyers, our team the necessary paperwork to notify the USDA appeal the decision. We’ll gather necessary evidence, and our team will draft the necessary appeals briefs containing all of the case law, evidence, etc. which is necessary to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to change the legal decision, in the Administrative Review, we will file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. The Judicial Appeal is like a normal case, where you’ll be able to do discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our law firm 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 cases, 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, people getting SNAP benefits cant buy electronic goods. If, and when, you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Snap violation penalties can result in severe and business crushing penalties. If you conduct a major SNAP violation, then you may end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In most cases, owners of grocery stores didn’t even know SNAP violations are even occurring. Often, unethical employees who are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to consult 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 retail store, you have only ten days to respond to the claims. Failure to respond to the allegations will permanently crush your store. In addition, the USDA will make a verdict even if you choose not to respond to the allegations. Without legal experience, you won’t be able to retain EBT benefits. Hiring a SNAP violation lawyer gives you a fighting change. Our lawyers will fight the decision of the USDA and appeal any penalties. The fines 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. The policy must be in writing at the store and the policy must be at the time the violations were filed.

The store owner also has to be able to prove the compliance policy was in existence before the allegations, and was not drafted after the violation letter. The USDA will also look in order to check if the grocery store owners benefited in any way from the fraud, or if the business owners were aware of the fraud. Any involvement of the management can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any owner that receives 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.