Today the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services announced that all December Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits will be paid and available on EBT cards in one payment that will be made by December 11, 2020.  

This means that some SNAP recipients will receive benefits earlier than anticipated and in one payment as opposed to two.

DHS does not have time to send a notice to SNAP recipients. It has asked for help in making clients aware of this one-time change.

You can read the DHS press release here. 

DHS is altering the normal SNAP payment schedules to allow all benefits to be issued without risk of delay in case of a federal government shutdown. SNAP is a federally funded program, and the federal government is currently funded through December 11, 2020. A delay in authorizing new funding could disrupt benefit issuance.

Typically, SNAP benefits are issued during the first 10 business days of the month and emergency allotments, which are authorized by the Families First Coronavirus Response Act and currently go to about 60 percent of SNAP households, in the second 10 business days after this issuance.

Also, just a reminder that SNAP recipients can now use online purchasing to use SNAP funds for grocery delivery or for prepayment of curbside pick-up at certain retailers. Earlier this year, Pennsylvania joined a federal pilot program allowing SNAP recipients to purchase food online through certain approved retailers: Walmart, Amazon, the Fresh Grocer, Shoprite, and, most recently, Aldi. Funds can only be used for food products and not processing fees, delivery charges, or tips.