Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Fargo Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your grocery store, then may have gotten a official notice from the USDA. This notification is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is claiming you violated the SNAP program. The government will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation notice, which will contain transactions that occurred at your grocery store that the government is saying violates one or more groups of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation notice, you must speak to our our law firm. It’s critical you understand, you only have 10 days to respond. If you don’t respond, the government will terminate/suspend your grocery store’s ability to accept EBT payments.

About The SNAP Program

This program provides families with a certain amount of money each month. The SNAP program benefits are distributed to consumers via an EBT card. The benefits on this card cannot be used for general usage, and they cannot be used for fraudulent cash back transactions. The EBT cards took the place of food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued in the state where the recipient lives. The SNAP program is operated on a nationwide level by the federal government.

The federal 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 legal violations occur if and when a store is in violation of the rules below.

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

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

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

Your store redeemed more EBT food stamps than sale of actual food during the same period.

Your employees took SNAP benefits from someone who isn’t eligible to use the benefits.

How we can help defend you against a SNAP violation notice

Spodek Law Group has experience managing SNAP violations letters. Our law firm can handle your SNAP Violation appeal in all 3 phases of a SNAP action.

Sending the violation letter is the initial step which is going to be taken by USDA to remove your EBT license. This comes with no warning can come at any time. The charging letter will contain allegations, but most letters will mention 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.

Once the USDA reviews your answer to the violation letter, the USDA may still feel that your store has violated the rules. If that happens, the USDA will 100% issue a second letter which outlines their decision to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the allegations set forth. You have 10 days to appeal this. If you don’t, then you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. After you hire our lawyers, we’ll file the necessary paperwork to notify the government appeal the decision. Our lawyers gather necessary evidence, and we will draft draft an appellate brief containing all of the legal laws, legal evidence, etc. which is necessary to overturn the decision.

If the USDA refuses to overturn 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 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 grocery store retailer, there’s a lot of rules and regulations have to obey in order to accept EBT. In most normal situations, many grocery store owners have no issues adhering to them. However, SNAP can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limitations. 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 result in severe and business crushing penalties. If you conduct a serious SNAP violation, then you might end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In many situations, store owners don’t know SNAP violations are even happening. In many situations, unethical employees are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to consult with a SNAP violation lawyer in order to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is presented to your grocery store, you have only 10 days to respond to the violations. Failure to respond to the allegations will permanently crush your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will deliver a verdict even if you choose not to respond to the allegations. In the absence of a SNAP violation attorney, you cannot defend your store. Hiring a SNAP violation lawyer gives you the ability to fight for your rights. Our SNAP appeals lawyers will challenge the findings of the USDA and appeal any penalties. The penalties imposed can expensive – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose chooses to impose large fines to in order to curb future violations. The USDA will typically look to see if you have a compliance policy in place. The policy must be in writing at the store and the policy must be when the violations were filed.

The grocery store also has to 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 owners benefited from the violations, or if the owners were aware of the fraud. If the management was involved it can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any store that receives a allegation 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.