Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Littleton Snap Violation Lawyers

If you’re a retailer who accepts EBT at your grocery store, then it’s possible have gotten a official warning from the USDA. The letter is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is stating you are in violation of the SNAP program. The government will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation notice, which will have records of transactions which happened at your grocery store which the government claims violates one or more genres of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation letter, you should definitely contact our law firm. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you don’t respond, the USDA will suspend your stores privilege to accept EBT payments.

About The SNAP Program

This program helps families with a certain amount of money each month. These benefits are distributed through an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on the card are not for general usage, and they can’t be used for fraudulent cash back transactions. The cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued by each state individually which the SNAP participant lives. This program is operated on a national level by the government.

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

The retail store was involved intrafficking SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting taking the benefits, or theft of the benefits.

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

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

Your store redeemed more EBT food stamps than actual food sales at the same time.

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

How to defend your store against a SNAP violation

Spodek Law Group has immense experience managing SNAP appeals letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP violation process in all 3 phases of a SNAP action.

Sending the letter is the initial step which is going to be taken by USDA to take away your right to take EBT benefits. This letter may come with no warning can come at any time. The violation letter has a variety of allegations, but most of them will mention serious allegations, have evidence attached proving the violations. You have only 10 days to respond. 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.

Once the USDA reviews your answer to the violation letter, the USDA might still decide that a violation has occurred. If this happens, they’ll will 100% issue a second letter that specifically states the agencies decision to suspend or disqualify the store based on the allegations set forth. Like before, you have ten days to protest the decision. If you don’t, then you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our firm, we file the appeal and notify the government we are going to appeal their decision. We’ll gather necessary evidence, and our team will draft an appellate brief which contains all of the legal laws, legal evidence, etc. which is critical to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to overturn 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 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 grocery 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, SNAP 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 probably get a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can result in severe and business crushing penalties. If it’s believed you did a major SNAP violation, then you may end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In many situations, store owners didn’t even know the violations are even occurring. Often, it’s dishonest employees who are misusing the SNAP EBT program. If you’re accused of a SNAP violation to discuss your case with a SNAP violation appeals lawyer to ensure sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is sent to your retail store, you have only 10 days to respond to the claims by the USDA. Your failure to respond will permanently harm your store. If you don’t respond 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 a fighting change. Our lawyers will fight the decision of the USDA and appeal any decision. The financial penalties imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA purposefully imposes huge 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 the policy must be when the allegations were filed.

The grocery store also has to be able to prove the above mentioned policy was in existence before the allegations, and was not drafted after the violation letter. The USDA typically also looks in order to see if the grocery store owners benefited in any way from the fraud, or were aware of the violation. If the managers were involved, it can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any owner that receives a allegation letter speak to 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.