Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Longmont 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 notice is probably a SNAP violation notice, 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 contain records of transactions that happened at your retail store which the USDA claims violates one or more groups of violations.

The first thing after you get a SNAP violation notice, you must contact our legal team. It’s critical you understand, you only have 10 days to respond. If you don’t respond, the USDA will terminate/suspend your stores privilege to accept EBT.

About The SNAP Program

This program provides families with money each month. The SNAP program benefits are given through an EBT card. The benefits on the EBT card are not for general usage, and they cannot be used for cash back services. The cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued by each state individually where the consumer lives. The program is operated on a nationwide level by the federal government.

The federal and the benefits that come with it 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 store is in violation of the rules below.

The retail store is accused ofthe trafficking of SNAP benefits. This can mean fraudulently accepting benefits, or theft of the benefits.

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

The store submitted incorrect info on your store’s application to accept EBT benefits.

The store took money for more EBT food stamps than sale of actual food at the same time.

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

Defending against a SNAP Violation Letter

Our law firm has immense experience managing SNAP violations letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP violation process in all 3 phases of a SNAP violation action.

Sending the letter is the first step which is taken by the USDA USDA to remove your right to take EBT benefits. The letter can come with no warning and can happen at any time. The SNAP violation letter will contain allegations, but most of them will mention violations, and have attached documents detailing the violations. You have only 10 days to respond. Once you hire our law firm, we 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 violation letter, the USDA might still believe that your store has violated the rules. If this happens, they’ll will issue another letter that specifically states the governments legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the grocery store based on the accusations previously mentioned. Like before, you have ten days to appeal the decision. If you choose not to, you’ll be stuck with the USDA decision. After you hire our law firm, our team the appeal and notify them we are going to appeal their decision. We’ll collect necessary evidence, and our team will generate the necessary appeals briefs containing all of the case law, evidence, etc. which is needed to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to change the legal decision, in the Administrative Review, our lawyers will file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. The Judicial Appeal is like a normal federal court case, where you’ll have to do standard processes like discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our lawyers can handle these cases in all 50 states.

SNAP Violations

As a food store retailer, there’s a lot of rules and regulations which you have to adhere to for EBT. In most cases, many retail store owners don’t run into problems. However, USDA’s SNAP program can be tricky. SNAP handles the Electronic Benefits Transfer Card, and has limitations. For example, people getting SNAP benefits cant get electronic goods. As a retailer, if you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can include fines and penalties. If you conduct a major violation, then you might end up with either a permanent or temporary disqualification. In many situations, store owners don’t even know the violations are even happening. In many situations, unethical employees are misusing the SNAP EBT program. It’s helpful to speak with a SNAP violation attorney in order to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a SNAP violation letter is sent to your store, you have only 10 days to respond to the claims. Failure to respond to the violations will permanently harm your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will generate a verdict even if you choose not to respond to the allegations. Without legal experience, you won’t be able to retain EBT benefits. Retaining a SNAP violation lawyer gives you the ability to fight for your rights. Our SNAP appeals lawyers will fight the findings of the USDA and appeal any penalties. The financial penalties imposed can be huge – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA purposefully imposes huge fines to in order to curb future violations. The USDA look to see if you have a store compliance policy. The policy must be in writing at the store and in effect when the violations were filed.

The retailer also 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 in order to check if the owners benefited in any way from the fraud, or were aware of the violation. If the management was involved it can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any owner that gets a violation 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.