Historically, the account number has been required if you have multiple accounts for a recipient for whom you are filing more than one of the same form type. For example, if an issuer has three separate pension distributions for the same payee and three separate Forms 1099-R are filed; three separate unique account numbers are required. Also, the IRS requires the account number if you check the "FATCA filing requirement" checkbox.
With the lower threshold announcement T.D.9972, the IRS also released new specifications for filing corrected returns electronically. For Electronic Filing of Forms 1098 and 1099, an account number must appear on the initial form and the number must match up to the one on the corrected form for the IRS to identify and process corrected forms properly. View Publication 1220 for more details.
As result of these enhanced requirements from the IRS, moving forward our platform will recommend that the issuer assign an account number on all original information return form types including Forms 1098 and 1099. For forms 1099-DIV, 1099-INT and 1099-R, an account number is required.
Here are some helpful tips to creating an account number –
- An issuer’s account number for the payee may be a checking account number, savings account number, serial number, or any other number assigned to the payee by the issuer that will distinguish the specific account.
- This number must be unique for each information return of the same type for the same payee.
- A payee’s account number may be given a unique sequencing number, such as 01, 02 or A, B, etc., to differentiate each reported information return.
- Don’t use the payee’s TIN since this will not make each record unique. This information is critical when corrections are filed.
- The account number can be any combination of no more than 20 alpha, numeric, or special characters.
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