SNAP provides support for low-income seniors, people with disabilities living on fixed incomes, and other low-income households. The Florida Department of Children and Families Office of Economic Self-Sufficiency (ESS) is responsible for determining SNAP eligibility and distributing benefits to Florida SNAP accounts on a fixed monthly schedule.

                By                    Josephine Nesbit

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Your Florida EBT card can be used anywhere displaying the Quest logo, which includes most major grocery store chains, some retailers and participating farmers’ markets. Depending on your location, groceries may even be purchased using your EBT card and delivered to your home. 

Your benefits can be used to purchase most food items, including:

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  • Fruits and vegetablesMeat, poultry and fishDairy productsBreads and cerealsSnack foods and non-alcoholic beveragesSeeds and plants, which produce food for the household to eat

Among the items you can’t buy with SNAP benefits are alcoholic beverages, tobacco products, vitamins, medicines, supplements, live animals, pet foods, cleaning supplies, paper products, cosmetics and hot, ready-to-eat foods.

There’s also the SUNCAP Program, which is a food assistance program for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients. If you already receive SNAP benefits, you may be automatically enrolled in the SUNCAP Program when you become eligible for SSI.

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Florida also offers a wide range of benefits and services to SNAP customers, including the following:

Florida’s SNAP benefits are sent out between the 1st and the 28th of every month, based on the 9th and 8th digits of your Florida case number (read backward) after dropping the 10th digit.

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Here are Florida’s food assistance payment dates for December 2022:

SNAP recipients will also receive another big payment in December which includes the 12.5% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) approved for 2023. The COLA for 2023 will run through Sept. 30, 2023, which will help SNAP recipients deal with rising food costs.

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