Ordinarily, a company isn’t affiliated with the affiliates of its affiliates.
That sentence may sound a little silly, but it encapsulates an important principle about the breadth of the SBA’s affiliation rules. As demonstrated in a recent SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals decision, the SBA doesn’t apply its rules to create “chain affiliation.”
The SBA’s regulations do not allow an 8(a) company to file a size protest challenging the award of an 8(a) sole source contract to a competitor.
In a recent size appeal decision, the SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals confirmed that size protests relating to 8(a) sole source awards can be filed by contracting officers or the SBA itself–but not by competitors.
If a prospective contractor wishes to file a size protest, it must act quickly: the protester ordinarily has five business days to initiate its protest. But does the deadline get extended if the agency takes corrective action in response to a bid protest?
Maybe, maybe not. A recent SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals decision examines that question.
A subsidiary cannot file an SBA size protest on behalf of its parent company.
Last week, I wrote about an SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals case holding that a parent couldn’t file a size appeal on behalf of its subsidiary. Unsurprisingly, it turns out that the same principles apply to initial size protests, too.
A recent SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals decision confirms that there is no exception for nonprofit organizations when it comes to affiliation issues.
In the case, SBA OHA found affiliation between a self-certified small business and a nonprofit organization based on close family members controlling both the business concern and the nonprofit. Adding in the receipts from the affiliated nonprofit made the business in question ineligible for small business status.
A “similarly situated entity” cannot be an ostensible subcontractor under the SBA’s affiliation rules.
In a recent size appeal decision, the SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals confirmed that changes made to the SBA’s size regulations in 2016 exempt similarly situated entities from ostensible subcontractor affiliation.
Editor’s Note: You can find our updated post on Affiliation here.
Affiliation might be one of the scariest words to small business government contractors. But why?
Here are five things you should know about affiliation: