Caucasian Female 8(a) Applicants Now Have a Much Higher Rate of Success
MAJOR CHANGE: A recent decision (July 19, 2023) by the United States District for the Easter District of Tennessee resulted in change in the way the SBA determines Social Disadvantage for the purposes of 8(a).
The 8(a) Certification can be a major sales growth engine for your small business. The average 8(a) has over $5.5 million per year in federal contracts.
NEW RULING: ULTIMA SERVICES V. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
Currently All Women (Minority Group Member or Caucasian Woman) and those suffering from Handicap bias, can potentially apply for the SBA 8(a) Certification. For Women this gives them access to both the WOSB program as well as 8(a).
The SBA stopped presuming social disadvantage. All program applicants must now submit a personal narrative to the SBA that demonstrates their social disadvantage, a procedure that had already been required of individuals who were not members of one of the racial groups. Because all groups are now required to submit a narrative to prove social disadvantage the SBA reduced the evidentiary burden.
PRIOR RULE: Since 1978 or for 45 Years the 8(a) program was governed by presumption of social disadvantage for groups with minority heritage. These people fit into the following ethnic categories: Asian Pacific Americans, Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, Subcontinent Asian Americans, and Native Americans.
The past 8(a) application process for Caucasian women generally required the production of over 20 stories going over the gender bias that a woman suffered.
The application process for Caucasian woman ended in a denial approximately half of the time and if the firm wanted to continue to push forward it would require a costly OHA appeal. In general, under this process we had about three clients per year that would move forward with this process to become 8(a) Certified. It was a challenge, under those rules these clients deserved to be in the program.
To help women the SBA created a different runway. Those were the WOSB and EDWOSB programs.
WHY WOMEN STILL WANT 8(a): Unfortunately for women the number of set-asides contracts in the WOSB program is around 200-300 million where in the 8(a) program it is over $10 billion. This is not to say that the WOSB certification is not valuable, because it is.
NEW REQUIREMENTS: The Ultima Serv. Corp Decision changes this because now ALL applicants are required to submit a narrative, not just non-presumed group candidates such as Caucasian women. Furthermore, the SBA requires 2 stories no more no less and 3rd party verification of some percentage of these stories is no longer part of the process.
TIME TO ACT: The reality is that Caucasian women are currently treated the same for purposes of obtaining the 8(a) certification as all other applicants. Therefore, if you were ever considering obtaining the 8(a) certification now would be a good time before congress alters this loophole.
If you would like to find out if your experiences would qualify you for being socially disadvantaged based upon gender bias give us a call as we are always happy go over the requirements.
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