SNAP Questions and Answers Concerning the Trafficking Controls and Fraud Investigations Final Rule
FNS is issuing this affirmation of a final rule, without change, of an interim rule that amended SNAP regulations, to require state agencies to monitor electronic benefit transfer card replacement requests and send notices to those clients who have requested four cards within a 12-month period.
The rule entitled Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Trafficking Controls and Fraud Investigations was published on August 21, 2013. The ICR for this rule approved the creation of a new information collection, which has been assigned the OMB Control Number 0584-0587. The Office of Management and Budget cleared the associated ICR on Sept. 23, 2013. This document announces the approval of the ICR.
The Improper Payments Information Act of 2002 requires all federal agencies to calculate the amount of erroneous payments in federal programs and to periodically conduct detailed assessments of vulnerable program components. This 2012 assessment of the family daycare homes component of CACFP provides a national estimate of the share of the roughly 125,000 participating FDCHs that are approved for an incorrect level of per meal reimbursement, or reimbursement "tier" for their circumstances.
In February, 2013, FNS published final regulations revising the definition of trafficking. It subsequently came to our attention that some states were not clear that upon its effective date, federal law takes precedence and states were expected to implement the new federal trafficking definition.
FNS is issuing a final rule to amend Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program regulations to allow state agencies to deny a request for a replacement card until contact is made by the household with the state agency, if the requests for replacement cards are determined to be excessive.
Trafficking of SNAP benefits occurs when SNAP recipients sell their benefits for cash to food retailers, often at a discount. Although trafficking does not increase costs to the federal government, it is a diversion of program benefits from their intended purpose of helping low-income families access a nutritious diet. This report, the latest in a series of periodic analyses, provides estimates of the extent of trafficking during the period 2009 through 2011.
The Food and Nutrition Service is changing the SNAP regulations pertaining to client benefit use, participation of retail food stores and wholesale food concerns in SNAP, and SNAP client participation in the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations.