Outta Excuses Grant Review — 2026
Is the Outta Excuses grant legit? Yes — it has paid named people, and it charges $15 to enter. The Outta Excuses Small Business Empowerment Grant advertises $3,000 a quarter plus a $10,000 bonus due in November 2026, and its own site names 16 past recipients, one of them a $10,000 winner who appeared on the list after the previous bonus round. The sponsors are not a charity. The program’s terms name two North Carolina LLCs, Be Intentional LLC and Tillman Group & Associates LLC, both run by business coach Autrina Tillman. Entry costs a nonrefundable $15, paid by card before anyone reads your application. Two cautions decide whether it is worth your $15 today. The quarterly dates have shifted every round, and on October 5, 2026 the site still showed a July–September window that has already ended. And the rules let the sponsors use your name and your application in their marketing, worldwide and permanently.
Updated October 5, 2026 — the award, the fee, the eligibility rules, the full Terms and Conditions, the live application form and the past-recipients page were read first-hand on outtaexcuses.com on October 5, 2026, and archived copies of the grant page and recipients page from August 2024 to May 2026 were read the same day through the Internet Archive. The last program period the site published ran July 1 to September 30, 2026 and has ended; the next quarter’s dates had not been posted when we checked. Reviewed monthly.
Who runs the Outta Excuses grant
Two for-profit companies run by the same founder. The Outta Excuses terms name Be Intentional LLC and Tillman Group & Associates LLC as the sponsors. Both are businesses run by Autrina Tillman of the Charlotte area: one a coaching academy, the other an independent insurance agency. There is no foundation or 501(c)(3) behind this grant.
The “General” section of the program’s Terms and Conditions states it directly: the Outta Excuses Grant Initiative “is sponsored and administered Be Intentional LLC and Tillman Group & Associates LLC.” The site’s “Meet the Visionary” page credits Autrina Tillman as the person behind it, inspired by coaching clients who “often needed a financial boost.” Her two businesses have their own websites. Be Intentional With Autrina describes itself as a mastermind academy of eight coaches, founded by Tillman, covering business funding, trust creation and nonprofit development. Tillman Group & Associates LLC is her independent insurance agency, selling health, life, Medicare Advantage and group coverage from a base in Charlotte, North Carolina. The grant’s contact address is a suite on Sam Furr Road in Huntersville, North Carolina.
That makes the Outta Excuses grant a business-run grant, not a charity’s. That is common and not a mark against it. Plenty of good small grants are paid out of a company’s marketing budget. It does change two things you can check. First, there is no IRS filing to read. A search of the IRS exempt-organization data on ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer returns no organization named Outta Excuses, so no Form 990 shows what has been paid out. Second, applications are reviewed by the sponsor’s own coaching business and its advisory board. The rules say entries go to “Be Intentional Coaching and Outta Excuses Advisory Board.” The board page names three members: Renee Bobb, Gordan D. Melville and Dr. Oliver T. Reid. We tried to pull the two LLCs’ records from the North Carolina Secretary of State, but its search blocks automated lookups, so we have not confirmed their registration dates. If that matters to you, the state’s business search is free to use by hand.
The paper trail: 16 named recipients and a bonus that was paid
The program publishes its recipients by name and business, which most fee-charging microgrants do not. Archived copies show that list growing from six names in November 2024 to sixteen in October 2026, including a $10,000 recipient who appeared after the bonus advertised for September 2025. That is real evidence that money has gone out.
The “Past Recipients” page on outtaexcuses.com lists 16 people, each with a business name and most with an amount. Read on October 5, 2026, it shows one $10,000 recipient (Amaka Nwafor, founder of Amaka Rose), four $3,000 recipients (AW Burgess, Kim Cross, Tillies Daniel and Emily Jefferson), three $1,000 recipients, four $500 recipients, three people listed as free-coaching recipients, and one with no amount shown. Added up, the published amounts come to $27,000. The page has no dates and does not say which round each award came from. It also lists award sizes the grant no longer advertises ($500 and $1,000), so not every name maps to the current $3,000 format.
Dates can be recovered from copies of the page saved by the Internet Archive. They show the list was built up over time, not posted all at once:
| Archived copy | Names on the page | New since the previous copy |
|---|---|---|
| Nov 3, 2024 | 6 | AW Burgess ($3,000), Tanisha Layne ($1,000), Paralee Massie-Armstrong ($500), three coaching recipients |
| Feb 16, 2025 | 10 | Chante Porcaro (labelled $3,000 on this copy), Cynitra Stewart ($1,000), Tisha Novello ($500), Terrence Palmer ($500) |
| Jun 15, 2025 | 12 | Kim Cross ($3,000), Julia Glassman ($500) |
| Oct 9, 2025 | 13 | Tillies Daniel ($3,000) |
| Feb 14, 2026 | 15 | Amaka Nwafor ($10,000), Salina Thompson ($1,000) |
| Oct 5, 2026 (live) | 16 | Emily Jefferson ($3,000) |
The $10,000 line is the useful one. Every archived copy of the grant page from August 2024 through October 2025 advertised the bonus as “$10,000 awarded in September 2025.” A $10,000 recipient shows up on the next archived copy of the recipients page, in February 2026. That timing is consistent with the advertised bonus being paid, though the site never says so in as many words. One label has changed: Chante Porcaro was marked as a $3,000 recipient on the February 2025 copy and has no amount on the current page. We note it without explanation, because the site gives none.
On the core question of legitimacy, the pattern matters more than any single name. A fraudulent “grant” asks for money after telling you that you have won, as a release or processing fee. The Outta Excuses grant takes its $15 at the front door, discloses it on the grant page before you start, and publishes people who say they received money. Two recipient profiles describe what the money paid for: a cinema lens for Terrence Palmer’s camera, and turf for Tisha Novello’s indoor softball facility. That is not the shape of a scam. What it does not give you is an outside audit. With no charity filings, the recipients page, written by the sponsor, is the only record there is.
What the Outta Excuses application actually is
A single web form with about a dozen fields, two of them written answers, followed by a $15 card checkout on the same page. Nothing is uploaded at entry. Proof of eligibility is checked only for potential winners.
The application at outtaexcuses.com/apply, read in full on October 5, 2026, asks for: first and last name; phone and email (both required); gender; the state where your business is registered; a website or social media page; when you started the business; “Describe your story and the nature of your business”; annual revenue; “How would you use the funding?”; and, for businesses under a year old, revenue so far. Below that sits a payment block headed “Outta Excuses Grant Application Fee” for $15, taken through a live card checkout that also accepts Cash App Pay, Amazon Pay and Afterpay.
- DoThe writing is the application. There is no pitch deck, budget or financial statement field. The two written answers about your story and your use of the money are what a reviewer reads. Write them the way you would for any grant: specific, numbers where you have them, and a concrete purchase you can name.
- NotePaperwork comes later, if you are picked. The grant page tells applicants to “submit proof of annual revenue under $500,000,” but the form has no upload field. The eligibility rules explain the order: “The potential winners are subject to verification of eligibility by Sponsors, which may include completing associated documentation.” Have your registration and revenue records ready rather than attaching them up front.
- NoteA marketing consent box sits above the Submit button. Ticking it consents to “email and text message communications from Be Intentional and the Outta Excuses Grant” covering grant updates and also “special offers, promotions, and other related communications.” Read it before you tick it.
- NoNo published decision notice. Neither the grant page nor the terms say how or when applicants who are not selected will hear. Plan on silence unless you win, and keep a copy of what you wrote: the terms say an entry “cannot be modified in any way” once submitted.
The same site runs a separate pitch competition with its own form: up to $2,500 in cash for three finalists who pitch live at the sponsors’ “10K Funding & Wealth Summit” in Charlotte on Friday, November 13, 2026. Entering means a 90-second Instagram or Facebook reel, a tag and hashtags, and the same $15 “Outta Excuses Grant Application Fee” at checkout. It is a separate entry from the quarterly grant, so if you do both, you pay $15 twice. The summit itself sells tickets, and vendor tables cost $250.
Who qualifies for the Outta Excuses grant, and where its two rule pages disagree
A registered US business with under $500,000 a year in revenue, run by an adult who is its lead executive. The grant page narrows that to LLCs and 501(c)(3) nonprofits. The separate eligibility page adds a $125,000 cap on last quarter’s revenue and a “creative entrepreneur” requirement it never defines.
The Outta Excuses grant states its rules in two places, and they do not say quite the same thing. The grant page lists two qualifications: “Must have a registered LLC or a registered non-profit (501(c)3)” and “Must generate under $500,000 per year,” plus legal residency in the 50 states, Washington, D.C. or Puerto Rico, and an age of 18 or older (19 in Alabama and Nebraska). The Eligibility section of the terms is broader on business type and stricter on money. It accepts any “for-profit OR non-profit business” that is registered. It requires the applicant to be the business’s lead executive (founder, president, CEO or similar). And it sets the revenue test as “less than $500,000 in 2023 gross annual revenue; AND less than $125,000 in the last quarter.”
Three practical readings follow. A sole proprietor without a registered entity fails both versions; that one is clear. A registered corporation passes the eligibility page but not the grant page’s “LLC or 501(c)3” wording, so email grant@outtaexcuses.com before paying $15 to find out which rule applies. And the $125,000-last-quarter cap is a real second gate. A business doing $450,000 a year with a strong recent quarter could clear the annual limit and still fail it. The eligibility page also says entrants “Must be a creative entrepreneur as defined here,” but the page holds no definition or link for that term, and the “2023” revenue year has not been updated. Treat both as questions to ask, not as reasons on their own to skip.
The quarterly calendar, as the Outta Excuses site has published it
Quarterly in name, irregular in practice. Published windows have run anywhere from 79 to 108 days, one ran two weeks past the end of its quarter, and the bonus date has moved twice. On October 5, 2026 the site had not yet posted dates for the October–December quarter.
The Outta Excuses “Program Period” rule says the period “repeats every quarter thereafter” and also that the “Sponsor reserves the right to shorten or lengthen the Program Period for any reason in its sole discretion.” Archived copies of the grant page show the second sentence being used:
| Archived copy | Program period as printed | Bonus as printed |
|---|---|---|
| Aug 19, 2024 | No period printed | $10,000, September 2025 |
| Oct 6 & Dec 5, 2024 | Sept 16, 2024 to Dec. 30, 2024 | $10,000, September 2025 |
| Mar 22 & Jun 15, 2025 | January 1, 2025 to March 31, 2025 (still shown in mid-June) | $10,000, September 2025 |
| Oct 9, 2025 | June 30, 2025 to October 15, 2025 | $10,000, September 2025 |
| Feb 14, 2026 | January 4, 2026 to “March 31st, 2025” (year as printed) | $10,000, September 2026 |
| May 18, 2026 | April 13, 2026 to June 30, 2026 | $10,000, November 2026 |
| Oct 5, 2026 (live) | July 2, 2026 to September 30, 2026 (the Program Period page says July 1) | $10,000, November 2026 |
Read that table as a description of a small team’s website, not as a sign of bad faith. But it has a practical consequence. You cannot set your calendar by “quarterly.” One window ran 108 days and another 79. The page kept showing the January–March 2025 window until at least mid-June. And the bonus date moved from September 2025 to September 2026 to November 2026 as one round ended and the next was announced. The last published window ended on September 30, 2026. If the next one follows the stated pattern, it would cover October through December 2026, but the site had not said so when we checked on October 5, 2026.
The $10,000 bonus is advertised as “awarded in November 2026,” with “All applicants” entered automatically. That month lines up with the sponsors’ summit on November 13, 2026, whose page calls the event “the $10,000 Outta Excuses Grant Summit,” but neither page says the bonus is drawn there or that you need a ticket. The grant page does not say how many quarters’ applicants share the bonus draw. Our program record for the Outta Excuses grant will carry the next window’s dates once the sponsor posts them; it is re-checked at each month rollover.
Waiting on a window that has not been posted? Fill the gap with programs that have one. Answer a short eligibility check and GrantCompass returns every US program matched to your business, most of them free to enter, and watches the deadlines on anything you star.
See your matches — freeThe odds math on the Outta Excuses grant
No applicant count is published, so no win rate can be calculated, and we will not invent one. What the published numbers do give you is a break-even point: on the $3,000 award alone, the $15 fee is worth its face value only if fewer than 200 people enter in a quarter.
Start with supply, which is published. The program advertises one $3,000 award per quarter, which is $12,000 a year, and a $10,000 bonus, for $22,000 a year in advertised cash. It also offers free weekly coaching for 30 days to the winner and to “3 additional winners.” Demand is not published anywhere. There is no applicant count, no figure for entries per quarter and no acceptance rate. Any website quoting you odds for this grant made the figure up.
What you can compute honestly is a threshold. If N people apply in a quarter, one $3,000 award is worth $3,000 ÷ N to each of them on average. That equals the $15 fee at N = 200. Counting the $10,000 bonus helps, but by how much depends on a detail the site leaves out. If the bonus were drawn only from one quarter’s applicants, the break-even would rise to about 867. If it is shared across every quarter’s applicants, which “All applicants are automatically entered” suggests, the real figure sits between those two numbers. This is not an estimate of your chances. It shows how crowded the field would have to be before the ticket costs more than the average payout.
| Program | Fee | Award per round | Break-even entrants per round |
|---|---|---|---|
| Outta Excuses grant | $15 | $3,000 per quarter (+ $10,000 bonus) | 200 (higher with the bonus) |
| SecretSoS Small Business Grant | $15 | $2,500 per quarter | 167 |
| HerRise MicroGrant | $15 | $1,000 per month | 67 |
| Amber Grant | $15 | three $10,000 grants per month | 2,000 |
| AdIQ Cares grant | Free | $2,500 per quarter | No fee to recover |
Against its own class the Outta Excuses grant is not a bad ticket. Per dollar of fee it buys a bigger quarterly prize than SecretSoS and a far bigger one than HerRise, and the bonus is a second draw on the same entry. The Amber Grant is the outlier, with ten times the prize money per round for the same $15, though it is open only to women-owned businesses. Two honest counterweights apply. A bigger prize almost certainly draws a bigger crowd, and none of these programs publishes its crowd, so the right-hand column ranks prize-per-fee, not anyone’s real odds. And the Outta Excuses rules restrict entry to registered businesses under $500,000, which keeps out idea-stage founders and sole proprietors. That field is narrower than a no-gate draw, though nobody can say by how much.
The fine print in the Outta Excuses Terms and Conditions
Broad, permanent publicity and content rights; your data shared with the sponsor’s coaching business; binding individual arbitration; and a fee that is not refunded. One clause names Etsy, which appears nowhere else on the site.
Your name and your application become marketing material, permanently
The “Publicity” section says that by entering, each entrant “permits the use of Entrant’s and Officer’s names and submitted content for programming, advertising, publicity, and promotional purposes in all media… worldwide and on the Internet, and in perpetuity,” without compensation or prior notice. It applies to every entrant, not only winners. The same section bars you from releasing your own publicity about the program “without Sponsor’s consent.” Many brand grants claim winner publicity rights. Claiming them over every entry is wider than most.
A content license that names a company not otherwise involved
“Other Entry Terms” grants “Sponsor and Etsy” a “royalty-free, irrevocable, perpetual, global, nonexclusive license” to use, modify and publish your entry, including on Be Intentional and Tillman Group websites and social accounts. Etsy is not mentioned anywhere else on the Outta Excuses pages we read, and we do not know why it appears here. The same section says the sponsor “will treat all information disclosed by Entrant as nonconfidential.” Do not put anything in your answers you would not want published.
Your details go to the coaching business
The “Use of Data” section says the sponsor “may share with Be Intentional LLC and its advisors this Private Information,” to be used under that company’s own privacy policy. Combined with the marketing checkbox on the form, expect to hear about coaching, events and offers. That is a normal trade for a business-run grant, and it is better that it is written down.
Disputes go to individual arbitration
“Arbitration” requires disputes to be settled “individually and exclusively by final and binding arbitration” through the American Arbitration Association, waives class actions and jury trials, and keeps one exit. Claims small enough for small claims court can be brought there instead. On a $15 fee, small claims is the realistic route anyway.
The $15 is not refunded, and the award is taxable
The grant page calls the fee “non-refundable,” and the checkout repeats that “all application fees are non-refundable” and that applying “does not guarantee funding.” We found no fee-waiver option. If you win, a business grant is generally ordinary taxable income; our guide to whether small business grants are taxable covers how that works.
Apply or skip: the verdict on the Outta Excuses grant
Apply if you are a registered LLC or nonprofit under both revenue caps, you are comfortable with the publicity terms, and the next quarter’s dates are posted. Skip it if you are a sole proprietor, if your application would contain anything you want kept private, or if $15 would come out of a month with no slack.
Apply if you fit the rules cleanly. The Outta Excuses grant pays more per dollar of fee than the other quarterly $15 grant in the comparison above, it has named recipients and a bonus that appears to have been paid, and one entry also puts you in the $10,000 bonus draw. The form is short enough to finish in one sitting. Wait until outtaexcuses.com shows a window that includes today’s date before you pay, and keep your own copy of your answers.
Skip it if you are a sole proprietor or unregistered (both rule pages exclude you), if your revenue sits near either cap, or if the publicity clause is a problem, since everything you submit can be used in the sponsors’ marketing forever, win or lose. Skip it too if you came here hoping for a charity-run grant. This one is run by a coaching business, and you will be marketed to.
Either way, it should not be your plan. $22,000 a year of advertised awards, nationally, is a small pool. The open-now report lists what is accepting applications today, and the microgrants open now page covers the small, fast awards this one competes with.
Worth pairing with, all open as of October 5, 2026
- SecretSoS Small Business Grant — the closest match: $2,500 a quarter for the same $15 fee, but with fixed calendar quarters, a published fourth-quarter deadline of December 31, 2026, an emailed confirmation when your application arrives, and a stated announcement day. If you want a quarterly ticket you can plan around, this is the one.
- AdIQ Cares Small Business Grant — $2,500 a quarter, free to enter, accepted year-round, and its page says every applicant is notified and strong applications roll forward to the next quarter. No fee, no window to miss.
- Galaxy Grant for Women and Minority Business Owners — $2,500, free, a 30-second form, and a deadline of October 31, 2026. For women or minority owners it is the cheapest bet on this list; our Galaxy Grant review walks through its winners record.
Find the quarterly grants with a window open right now
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The part of this grant a reviewer weighs is in our record, not on this page
Our record for the Outta Excuses grant carries 6 of the 7 Win Layer fields: who has tended to win, the traps that sink an entry, what to have on hand if you are picked, when the money lands and whether any of it can be taken back. They are locked on the free tier.
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See what Pro unlocks →The questions founders actually type about the Outta Excuses grant
Is the Outta Excuses grant a scam?
No. The Outta Excuses Small Business Empowerment Grant is run by two named North Carolina companies, Be Intentional LLC and Tillman Group & Associates LLC, both led by business coach Autrina Tillman, and its site names 16 past recipients with their businesses, including a $10,000 winner who appeared after the bonus advertised for September 2025. The $15 fee is disclosed before you apply and charged at entry, not demanded after a “win,” which is the pattern grant fraud follows. The fair criticisms are different. It is a business-run grant with no charity filings to check, the window dates have been inconsistent, and the terms give the sponsors permanent rights to use your name and application in their marketing.
When does the Outta Excuses grant open next?
The site had not said as of October 5, 2026. The last published program period ran from July 1 (July 2 on the grant page) to September 30, 2026, and has ended. The rules say the period “repeats every quarter thereafter,” which points to an October–December 2026 round, but the sponsor also reserves the right to shorten or lengthen any period. Past windows have opened as much as two weeks into a quarter (April 13, 2026) and run two weeks past one (October 15, 2025). Check that outtaexcuses.com shows dates covering today before you pay the $15.
Do I have to pay $15 to apply for the Outta Excuses grant?
Yes. The application ends in a $15 card checkout labelled “Outta Excuses Grant Application Fee,” and both the grant page and the checkout say it is nonrefundable. We found no fee-waiver option on the grant page, the terms or the form. The pitch competition charges its own separate $15, so entering both costs $30.
Can a sole proprietor or an unregistered business apply?
No. The grant page requires “a registered LLC or a registered non-profit (501(c)3),” and the eligibility rules require a business that is registered at the start of the application. A corporation is a grey area, because the eligibility page accepts any registered for-profit or nonprofit, while the grant page names only LLCs and 501(c)(3)s. Ask grant@outtaexcuses.com before paying if that is you.
How are Outta Excuses winners chosen and announced?
Entries are reviewed by a panel the rules name as “Be Intentional Coaching and Outta Excuses Advisory Board.” No scoring criteria, announcement date or notification method is published, and nothing says applicants who are not selected will be told. Potential winners go through eligibility verification, which “may include completing associated documentation.” Past winners are added to the Past Recipients page, which on archived copies has been updated every few months.
Do I need to apply separately for the $10,000 bonus?
No. The grant page says entry in the quarterly grant “qualifies your business for automatic enrollment” in the bonus, advertised as “$10,000 awarded in November 2026.” It does not say how many bonus winners there are or which quarters’ entrants are in the draw. Nothing on the site says you must attend the November 13, 2026 summit to be eligible.