2022–23 Unique Entity Identifier Transition

On March 20, 2023, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service issued policy memorandum SP 07-2023, CACFP 06-2023, SFSP 04-2023 (PDF), which addresses questions raised by program operators regarding the transition from the Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number to the Unique Entity Identifier (UEI) number.

As of April 4, 2022, federal agencies completed the required system transition to UEI. The transition from DUNS number to UEI numbers allows the government to streamline the entity identification and validation process, making it easier and less burdensome for entities to do business with the federal government.

The UEI is a 12-character alphanumeric identifier assigned to an entity by the System for Award Management (SAM). Program operators are not required to complete full entity registration in the SAM to obtain the UEI and may go directly to SAM.gov to obtain the UEI only. The process is minimal and only validates the entity's legal business name and address. Program operators who have already completed full SAM.gov registration have been automatically assigned the UEI. Please note that an UEI does not expire, but entities who receive direct funds from a federal agency must renew full registration of the UEI annually.

Child Nutrition Program (CNP) operators including institutions, facilities, sponsoring organizations, schools, and sponsors are required to have the UEI to receive payments from the California Department of Education (CDE) who administers the school nutrition and summer meal programs on behalf of the Federal government. Any of these entities that had already been assigned a DUNS prior to the transition should have had their DUNS number converted automatically to a UEI. However, entities with expired DUNS or those that had not yet obtained one needed to begin the process of obtaining one right away.

Contact Information

To find your agencies assigned UEI number, please visit the SAM web page .