By Koh Gui Qing and Michelle Price
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) will introduce new due diligence checks when it kicks off the third round of the country’s main small business pandemic aid program in coming days, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
The agency will no longer automatically approve Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans and will vet initial submissions, after loose controls allowed fraudsters and ineligible companies to get cash during the first rounds of the program, the people said.
A senior SBA official declined to comment on the process changes but said “lessons learned” from the previous rounds were being implemented.
(Reporting by Michelle Price; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
