Nationwide SNAP Violation Lawyers

Yuba City Snap Violation Lawyers

If you accept EBT at your retail store, then it’s possible have been the recipient of a a letter of warning from the USDA. The letter is most likely a SNAP violation letter, which is stating you violated the SNAP program. The USDA will attach a number of pages to the SNAP violation letter, and it will have records of transactions that occurred at your store which the government claims is in violation of one or more groups of violations.

After you get a SNAP violation notice, you should contact our law firm. Remember, you have only ten days to respond to the letter. If you choose to ignore, the USDA will terminate/suspend your stores privilege to accept EBT.

About The Program

The SNAP program helps families with funds to buy food each month. These benefits are distributed to consumers with an EBT card. The funds on the EBT card are not for general use, and they can’t be used for fraudulent cash back services. The EBT cards took over for food stamps in the 1990’s and the card is issued in the state where the consumer lives. The SNAP program is run on a nationwide level by the federal government.

The federal and it’s parameters are under handled 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 when a grocery store is in violation of the rules below.

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

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

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

The store redeemed more coupons than sale of actual food over the same period.

The employees of the store accepted 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 violation letters. Our team of attorneys can handle your SNAP Violation appeal in all phases of a SNAP violation action.

Sending the violation letter is the initial step taken by the USDA to take away your EBT license. This letter may come with no warning and can appear at any time. The charging letter contain details about alleged violations, but most of them will outline violations, have evidence attached proving the violations. Your response to the SNAP violation letter is due within 10 days. Once you hire Spodek Law Group, we 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 SNAP violation letter, the USDA may still believe that your store has violated the rules. If this happens, they’ll will issue a second letter which outlines their legal verdict to suspend or disqualify the store based on the accusations previously mentioned. You have 10 days to appeal this. If you don’t, you’ll be unable to protest the USDA decision. Once you hire our law firm, our team the legal papers and notify the government appeal the decision. We’ll gather necessary evidence, and we will draft generate an appellate brief containing all of the case law, legal evidence, etc. which is necessary to overturn the decision.

In the event the USDA refuses to change the violation claim, in the Administrative Review, we will file a Judicial review at the local Federal Court. This next phase is like a normal court case, where you’ll have to do standard processes like discovery, file motions, and have a trial. Our law firm can handle these cases in all 50 states.

SNAP Violations

As a food store retailer, there are many laws which you have to adhere to for EBT. In most cases, 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. If, and when, you violate the laws, you should expect getting a SNAP violation letter. Penalties of violating SNAP can result in severe and business crushing penalties. If it’s believed you did a major violation, then you might end up with either a permanent or temporary disqualification. In most cases, store owners don’t even know the violations were even happening. Often, it’s dishonest employees are misusing the SNAP program. If you’re accused of a SNAP violation to discuss your case with a SNAP violation appeals lawyer to make sure you don’t have your benefits revoked.

When a charge letter is presented to your retail store, you have only ten days to respond to the allegations. Your failure to respond to the violations will permanently crush your store. If you don’t respond the USDA will deliver a verdict even though 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 SNAP appeals lawyers will discredit 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 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 at the store and in effect when the violations were filed.

The retailer also 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 to see 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 receives 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.