About the Office of the National Ombudsman

The National Ombudsman's primary mission is to assist small businesses when they experience excessive or unfair federal regulatory enforcement actions, such as repetitive audits or investigations, excessive fines, penalties, threats, retaliation or other unfair enforcement action by a federal agency.

The National Ombudsman receives comments from small business concerns and acts as a liaison between them and federal agencies. Comments received from small businesses, are forwarded to federal agencies for a high level review and federal agencies are requested to consider the fairness of their enforcement action.

A copy of the agency's response is sent to the small business owner by the Office of the National Ombudsman. In some cases, fines have been lowered or eliminated and decisions changed in favor of the small business owner.

For instance, the Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor determined that a brewer and assistant brewer at a small Illinois brewery were not exempt from the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). After spending several thousand dollars on attorney fees and many hours on appeal, the brewery owner filed a comment with the National Ombudsman and the federal agency reversed its decision.

In another case, a small importer in Maryland had been fined by U.S. Customs for failure to notify them in the time period prescribed by regulation of the presence of unentered merchandise eligible for general order. When, at the request of the National Ombudsman, U.S. Customs reviewed the comment filed by the small business owner, all monies were refunded.

*The National Ombudsman cannot change, stop, or delay a federal agency enforcement action, nor assist with comments of a non-federal regulatory nature. Neither can the office help secure government contracts nor assist with government loan processing or approval.

Contact Us

You may contact the SBA's Office of the National Ombudsman by :

• Toll Free Phone: (888) REG-FAIR (734-3247)
  
  
• Fax: (202) 481-5719
  
  
• Email: ombudsman@sba.gov
  
  
• Mail:
• Office of the National Ombudsman
  U.S. Small Business Administration
  409 3rd Street, SW, MC2120
  Washington, DC 20416-0005