SBA’s Controls Over Cash Contributions and Gifts, Fiscal Year 2022

This report presents the results of our evaluation of the U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) handling of cash contributions and gifts. The objective of the evaluation was to determine the adequacy of SBA controls over the solicitation, acceptance, holding, and use of cash contributions and gifts.

We found SBA complied with the 2022 Consolidated Appropriations Act and SBA regulations and policies regarding soliciting and accepting cash contributions for National Small Business Week 2022. SBA’s Office of Communications and Public Liaison obtained proper approval from the Office of General Counsel for the 2022 business week cosponsored activity.

We determined SBA complied with applicable laws and SBA regulations and policies regarding the acceptance, holding, and use of gift funds. Specifically, the agency accepted a $505,879 unsolicited gift from the cosponsors of business week activities held between 2020 and 2022. Excess funds are the contributed cash or collected fees that are left over after expenses are subtracted from the revenues. This gift represented the cosponsors share of excess cash contributions that remained at the conclusion of the activities. The cosponsors elected to have their share of the excess funds be made a gift to SBA, available for the next National Small Business Week cosponsored event.

We made two recommendations to improve controls over 2022 business week closeout reporting and the government purchase card use. SBA management agreed with both recommendations and has fully implemented corrective actions for Recommendation 1.