Small Business Administration (SBA) conducts the 8a certification program to help business owners, belonging to minority communities and socially isolated groups and tribes, as well as women entrepreneurs, to emerge as the next breed of government contractors, suppliers and vendors. Becoming an SBA certified business has lots of advantages. Most importantly, it gives small business owners the outstanding opportunity to explore the vast expanse of the federal marketplace and sell their goods and products directly to the federal government and its several affiliated agencies. Besides, there are also a number of 8a certification benefits that the applicant firm must be aware of before applying for this coveted government certificate. Here I have tried to provide a well rounded picture to help you understand the SBA 8a certification requirement and benefits in detail.
First let me touch upon the SBA 8a certification requirement. These include the following –
• The SBA 8a certification applicant firm must be a hundred percent U.S owned company. SBA intends to help only American owned enterprises under this 8a program.
• The applicant firm must have an owner(s) who belong to one of the economically and socially backward groups, tribes and ethnic clans, and these include people from the Alaskan native community, the American Indian community, Black Americans, Americanized Hispanics and islanders of Hawaii, among others.
• The owner must have 51% sole share of the company ownership to his/her name, in case there are other partners of the business
• The applicant firm must be 2-3 years in the same business field
• The 8a applicant firm, must have a good financial standing and an overall good market reputation with a good credit score
• The company must provide documentation supporting all of the above and also include its NAICS code along with to help the SBA authorities in determining the actual size of its business
Now that you know the different SBA 8a certification requirement, it’s time to tread into the next level -‘understanding the 8a certification benefits’ in detail. Read on –
• The 8a certified businesses can receive contracts from federal clients which are up to $3 million and $5 million for goods and products, and manufacturing respectively.
• The process of awarding contracts by the federal agencies to 8a approved firms is smooth and fast sans the usual delay that’s quite a common occurrence during sanctioning of government orders and claims. This fast processing enables the 8a contracting firms to gain maximum profit out of a contract and deliver work on time to their federal clients.
• Subcontracting opportunity is also offered by select federal agencies to 8a certification approved firms with whom they have signed a contract. The main benefit if the process being that, the subcontracting firm will always try to deliver a fixed quantity of products of optimum quality to the federal buyer to ensure smooth business for years. The buyer gets quality product in time, the 8a firm gets to keep their fed contract secure and the subcontracting firm is also ensured of the next order.
• Finally, the SBA 8a certification benefits also include the opportunity for 8a approved firms to earn ‘sole-sourced’ contracts from the federal clients. ‘Sole sourced’ means that the 8a contracting firm do not require to bid on the federal project. This is no doubt the biggest benefit for the 8a certified company.
Now that you have gone through the exhaustive round-up of the several 8a certification benefits, it’s time to reflect on your current business standing and start doing ground work for applying to the SBA 8a authority to earn the coveted business certification. All the Best!
