Eligibility decisions and appeals

(a) Organizations applying for participation in the CFC will be notified of the eligibility decision electronically via the email address(es) listed in the charity application.

(b) Organizations that apply and are denied eligibility for inclusion on the Charity List may appeal the decision by submitting a request for reconsideration. This request must be received within 10 business days from the date the decision to deny eligibility was sent via email and shall be limited to those facts justifying the reversal of the original decision.

(c) All appeals must:

(1) Be in writing;

(2) Be received by the Director within 10 business days of the date the decision to deny the application was sent via email;

(3) Include a statement explaining the reason(s) why eligibility should be granted; and

(4) Include a copy of the communication from OPM disapproving the original application and supporting information to justify the reversal of the original decision.

(d) Applications or appeals of an adverse eligibility determination must be submitted in a timely manner as indicated above.

(e) Appeals may not be used to supplement applications with documents that did not exist or were not set forth in final form prior to the application deadline. For example, audited financial statements that were not prepared or were in draft form at the time of the deadline cannot be used to document eligibility. Similarly, charities that had applied for, but had not obtained, 501(c)(3) status from the IRS by the CFC application deadline are not eligible to participate for that campaign year.

(f) The Director's decision is final for administrative purposes.