Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Arizona Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your retail store, then you might have gotten a letter from the USDA. The letter is probably a SNAP violation notice, which is stating you are in violation of the SNAP program. The government will include proof to the SNAP violation notice, which will contain transactions which happened at your store which the USDA claims is in violation of one or more groups of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation notice, you should speak to our our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you don’t respond, the government will terminate/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 to consumers through an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on the EBT card are not for general use, and they can’t be used for cash back services. The EBT cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued by each state individually which the SNAP participant lives. The SNAP program is run on a nationwide level by the government.

This federal and it’s parameters are governed 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 took part inthe trafficking of SNAP benefits. This can mean fraudulently accepting the benefits, or stealing the benefits.

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

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

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

The employees of the store accepted 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 managing SNAP violations letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP Violation appeal in all phases of a SNAP violation action.

Sending the violation letter is the initial step taken by the USDA to take away your EBT license. This comes with no warning and can happen at any time. The SNAP violation letter has a variety of allegations, but most letters will detail 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 handle 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 SNAP violation letter, the USDA may still believe that your store has violated the rules. If that happens, the USDA will issue another letter which outlines the agencies legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the retail store based on the accusations previously mentioned. Like before, you have ten days to appeal this verdict. If you don’t, then you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our lawyers, we file the appeal to notify the government we are going to appeal their decision. Our lawyers collect necessary evidence, and our team will generate the necessary appeals briefs which contains all of the case law, evidence, etc. which is critical to change the outcome of the violations.

In the event the USDA refuses to change the violation claim, in the Administrative Review, our lawyers will file a Judicial review at the local Federal District Court. This next phase is like a normal federal court case, where you’ll have to do standard processes like 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 have to obey in order to accept EBT. In most cases, many grocery store owners don’t run into problems. However, USDA’s 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. Penalties of violating SNAP can result in severe fines. If you conduct a serious violation, then you might end up with either a permanent or temporary disqualification. In most cases, store owners didn’t even know SNAP violations were even happening. In many situations, dishonest employees who are misusing the SNAP EBT program. If you’re accused of a SNAP violation to consult with a SNAP violation lawyer to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is delivered to your retail store, you only have 10 days to respond to the allegations. Failure to respond to the allegations will permanently crush your store. In addition, the USDA will make a verdict even if you don’t respond to the allegations. In the absence of a SNAP violation attorney, you won’t be able to retain EBT benefits. Hiring a SNAP violation lawyer gives you a fighting change. Our lawyers will discredit the decision of the USDA and fight any penalties. The penalties imposed can expensive – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose chooses to impose huge fines to curb violations. The USDA will look to see if you have a store compliance policy in place. The policy must be in writing at the store and the policy must be when the violations were filed.

The store owner also be able to prove the above mentioned policy was in place before the charge, and wasn’t drafted after the violation was made. The USDA will also look to see if the retail 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 that gets a violation 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.