Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Eagan Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your retail store, then you might have gotten a official notice from the USDA. This notification is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is stating you have violated the SNAP program. The government will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation letter, and it will contain records of transactions that happened at your store that the USDA is saying violates one or more genres of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation letter, you must contact our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you choose to ignore, the government will suspend your stores ability to take EBT.

About The Program

The SNAP program provides families with funds to buy food each month. These benefits are distributed to consumers with an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on the 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 by each state individually which the SNAP participant lives. The SNAP program is run on a national level by the government.

The program and it’s benefits are governed by the US Code and the Code of Federal Regulations. The USDA FNS agency enforces the regulations and runs the program.

What’s a SNAP Violation

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

The store took part intrafficking SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting taking the benefits, or theft of the benefits.

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

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

The grocery store took money for more EBT food stamps than food sales over the same period.

The employees of the store have taken 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 immense experience handling SNAP violation letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP Violation appeal in all phases of a SNAP action.

The charging letter is the initial step taken by the USDA to take away your EBT license. This letter may come with, or without, prior warnings and can appear at any time. The SNAP violation letter will have allegations in it, but most of them will outline violations, with an attachment of details. You have only 10 days to respond. 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.

Once the USDA reviews your answer to the violation letter, the USDA may still believe that a violation has occurred. If that happens, the USDA will 100% issue another letter which outlines the governments decision to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the alleged violations. Like before, you have ten days to protest this decision. If you don’t, then you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. Once you hire our firm, we file the legal papers and notify the USDA appeal the decision. Our lawyers collect necessary evidence, and we will draft generate the necessary appeals briefs which contains all of the case law, legal evidence, etc. which is necessary to change the outcome of the violations.

If 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 process is like a normal court case, where you’ll be able to do discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our lawyers 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 grocery store owners have no problems adhering to them. However, the SNAP program can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limitations. For example, SNAP recipients cant purchase 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 SNAP violation, then you may end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In most cases, store owners don’t even know SNAP violations were even happening. Often, dishonest employees are misusing the SNAP program. If you’re accused of a SNAP violation to discuss your case with a SNAP violation lawyer to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is delivered to your grocery store, you only have 10 days to respond to the violations. Failure to respond to the violations will permanently harm your store. In addition, the USDA will deliver a verdict even if you don’t respond to the allegations. In the absence of a SNAP violation attorney, you cannot defend your store. Retaining a SNAP violation lawyer gives you the ability to fight for your rights. Our lawyers can discredit the decision of the USDA and appeal any decision. The penalties imposed can expensive – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA purposefully does large fines to curb violations. The USDA will look to see if you have a store compliance policy in place. It must be in writing and in effect at the time the allegations were filed.

The store owner also 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 in order to see if the grocery store owners benefited from the violations, or were aware of the violation. If the managers were involved, it can lead to disqualification.

It’s highly recommended any store that receives a violation 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.