Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Lakeland Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your retail store, then it’s possible have gotten a official notice from the USDA. This letter is probably a SNAP violation notice, which is stating you are in violation of the SNAP program. The USDA will include proof to the SNAP violation letter, which will contain transactions which occurred at your grocery store that the USDA is saying violates one or more genres of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation notice, you must speak to our our legal team. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you don’t respond, the USDA will terminate/suspend your grocery store’s ability to take EBT.

About The Program

This program helps families with get food each month. These benefits are given with an EBT card. The funds on this card aren’t for general use, and they cannot be used for fraudulent cash back transactions. 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 program is operated on a national level by the federal government.

This federal and the benefits that come with it 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 does it mean to have a SNAP violation

SNAP legal violations occur when a grocery store violates any of the following rules.

The grocery store was involved inthe trafficking of SNAP benefits. This can mean fraudulently accepting taking the benefits, or theft of the benefits.

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

Your store submitted incorrect info on your retail stores application to accept EBT benefits.

Your store took money for more coupons than actual food sales over the same period.

The employees of the store have taken SNAP benefits from someone who isn’t allowed to use them.

Defending against a SNAP Violation Letter

Spodek Law Group has experience handling SNAP violation letters. Our law firm can handle your SNAP violation process in all 3 phases of a SNAP Violation action.

Sending the violation letter is the first step taken by the USDA to remove your right to take EBT benefits. This comes with no warning can come at any time. The violation letter contain details about alleged violations, but most of them will lay out violations, with an attachment of details. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. Once 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.

After reviewing the store’s answer to the notice of violation, the USDA may still feel that a violation has occurred. If this happens, they’ll will definitely send a second letter that specifically states the agencies decision to suspend or disqualify the retail store based on the alleged violations. You have 10 days to appeal this. If you don’t, you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. After you hire our lawyers, we’ll file the appeal to notify them we are going to appeal their decision. Our lawyers gather necessary evidence, and we will draft generate the necessary appeals briefs which contains all of the legal laws, evidence, etc. which is necessary to fix the outcome.

In the event the USDA refuses to override the violation claim, in the Administrative Review, we’ll file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. This next phase 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 food store retailer, there’s a lot of rules and regulations you have to adhere to for EBT. In most normal situations, many retail store owners have no issues adhering to them. 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, SNAP recipients cant purchase electronic goods. If you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can result in severe and business crushing penalties. If you conduct a major violation, then you might end up with either a permanent or temporary disqualification. In most cases, store owners don’t know SNAP violations were even happening. In many situations, unethical employees are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to speak with a SNAP violation attorney to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is sent to your retail store, you only have 10 days to respond to the claims. Failure to respond will permanently crush your store. In addition, the USDA will make a verdict even if you don’t respond to the allegations. Without legal experience, you cannot defend your store. Hiring a SNAP violation lawyer gives you the ability to fight for your rights. Our lawyers can discredit the decision of the USDA and fight any decision. The penalties imposed can expensive – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA purposefully imposes huge fines to curb violations. The USDA look to see if you have a store compliance policy. The policy has to be in writing at the store and the policy must be when the violations were filed.

The grocery store must has to be able to prove the compliance policy was in place before the charge, and wasn’t drafted after the violation was made. The USDA typically also looks to check if the retail store 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 owner that gets a 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.