8/10/2019 40% Of The Women Owned Set Aside Small Business Contracts Claimed Ineligible

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40% Of The Women Owned Set Aside Small BusinessContracts Claimed Ineligible

The US Women Chamber Of Commerce announced something critical on November 11, 2014 for thePresident, SBA and the Congress which requires immediate action. They need to make the femaleowned small business contracts accountable. Call to action is required followed by publishing a reportfrom the government accountability office. It was released on November 17, 2014 for accountability inthe SBA based on the federal contracting of supposed women owned businesses who won governmentbids.

Details of the systematic as well as costly failure committed by the SBA related to the small businessowned by the females was presented to the outgoing Senator Mary Landrieu and Maria Cantwell alongwith the Chair and former Chair of Senate Committee. They were required to provide a GAO report,which said that more than 40 percent of the women owned government bids that were set side weregiven to the ineligible firms in fiscal year 2012 and 2013.

Here are the important disclosures of the GAO report:

Failure of Oversight

SBA had performed less oversight for the third party certifiers and it needs to work on developingprocedures that offer assurance that only those businesses will receive the women owned set asidecontracts or the government contracts that are eligible.

No Responsiveness

The SBA did not interview most of the third party certifiers in the program. It was unable to interviewthe WBENC (Womens Business National Enterprise Council). No procedures were performed regardingthe fee structures and even the certification.

No Action

No action was taken by the SBA for the rectification of its cooperation with the WBENC or for removingthe WBENC as the third party certifier. The Board of Directors from WBENC included some of the seniorCEOs from the largest firms in America. Many among these firms were the federal prime contractors.

Ignoring The Reports Of Potential FraudAfter reviewing monthly reports of the third party certifiers, it was found that one of the certified hadlisted 2 or 2 reports about the fraud among businesses. The SBA did not take any action for investigatingabout these reports.

Margot Dorfman, CEO of the U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce said that "it is clear that the supportof the SBA to females in the business is not what it is projected by the SBA in its press releases." When

8/10/2019 40% Of The Women Owned Set Aside Small Business Contracts Claimed Ineligible

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the financial results of these ineligible firms were assessed, it was revealed that the subterfuge andinaccuracies were translated into billions of dollars and this amount of money has been misattributed. Inthe fiscal year 2014, the potential dollar loss accounts for $5 billion.

According to Jim Ward, VP of Business Development at BidPrime , a government bid database and

research firm, "This same phenomena is already present in state and local government contractpractices, where there is even less oversight." He added that, "cities, counties and municipalities areunder a lesser microscope for their government contracts and bids. Many government bids which areissued for Women or Minority owned businesses either don't have competition or a proper vendoroutreach tool in order to advertise to women owned small businesses."

The GAO report also focused on disclosing ineligible firms in the database of the federal governmentacross various socioeconomic sectors in combination with the observations of GAO about the failure ofSBAs oversight. The President and the Administrator of SBA along with the Congress will be set up anaction plan for protecting the rights and opportunities of women who are running small businesses.

Visit at:-

http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-15-54

http://www.bidprime.com/tour

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