A recent SBA Final Ruling attempts to address an issue plaguing many small businesses: the small business spends time and resources to help a prime contractor with a proposal, but is subsequently shut out of any work once the contract has been awarded.
Under this new rule any large business awarded a contract over $650,000 (or $1.5M for construction) must make a ‘good faith effort’ to provide work to the subcontractor that helped prepare the proposal – or provide a written explanation if it does not. Contracting Officers will take compliance with this new rule into consideration when rating a large business’s past performance.