Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Lynchburg Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your retail store, then may have been the recipient of a a official warning from the USDA. This notification is probably a SNAP violation letter, which is alleging you have violated the SNAP program. The government will include proof to the SNAP violation letter, and it will contain transactions which occurred at your grocery store which the government is saying violates one or more genres of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation letter, you should contact our legal team. It’s critical you understand, you only have 10 days to respond. If you choose to ignore, the government will suspend your stores ability to accept EBT.

About The Program

This program helps families with funds to buy food each month. The SNAP program benefits are distributed with an EBT card. The SNAP benefits on this card cannot be used for general usage, and they can’t be used for fraudulent cash back services. The EBT cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and are issued in the state which the SNAP participant lives. This program is operated on a nationwide level by the federal 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 counts as a SNAP violation

SNAP legal violations happen if and when a grocery store is in violation of the rules below.

The grocery store is accused oftrafficking SNAP benefits. Examples of this is fraudulently accepting benefits, or stealing the benefits.

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

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

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

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

Defending against a SNAP Violation Letter

Spodek Law Group has immense experience managing SNAP violation 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 initial step which is going to be taken by USDA to take away your EBT license. This comes with no warning and can appear at any time. The violation letter contain details about alleged violations, but most letters will detail serious allegations, have evidence attached proving 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 might still feel that your store has violated the rules. If this happens, they’ll will issue another 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, then you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. After you hire our firm, we’ll file the appeal to notify them appeal the decision. We’ll collect necessary evidence, and we will draft draft an appellate brief which contains all of the legal laws, evidence, etc. which is critical to fix the outcome.

If the USDA refuses to change the binding decision, in the Administrative Review, we’ll 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. Our attorneys 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 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, people getting SNAP benefits cant buy electronic goods. As a retailer, if you violate the laws, you’ll get a SNAP violation letter. Snap violation penalties can include fines and penalties. If you conduct a major violation, then you might end up with a temporary or permanent disqualification. In many situations, owners of grocery stores didn’t know the violations were even occurring. In many situations, 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 lawyer to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is presented to your store, you only have 10 days to respond to the claims. Your failure to respond to the allegations will permanently harm your store. In addition, the USDA will generate 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 discredit the decision of the USDA and appeal any penalties. The fines imposed can expensive – to the tune of ten’s of thousands of dollars. The USDA on purpose chooses to impose huge fines to in order to curb future violations. The USDA look to see if you have a store compliance policy. The policy has to be in writing and in effect at the time the violations were filed.

The retailer must has to be able to prove the compliance policy was in existence before the allegations, and wasn’t drafted after the violation was made. The USDA will also look in order to see if the owners benefited from the violations, or were aware of the violation. If the management was involved it can lead to disqualification.

We highly recommend any store owner that gets a 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.