Catherine

Nothing reportable with facts as stated.

Section 529 plans to save for college expenses, set up by the individual states. No deduction when the contribution is made. No tax due on growth when withdrawn for education purposes as delineated. Annual contribution limited to the amount of the annual gift exclusion with a provision to "front-load" up to five years' contribution provided no additional gifts from same donors made for five years. Contributions can be made by parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, godparents, family friends -- anyone willing to put money to the kids' college. Some _states_ have tax benefits for contributions to their own state plans. Some of those plans have expenses that kill any tax benefit, some don't. Catherine

My clients receive them when I print them out and give the coupons to them!

Unless he does this regularly, I'd put it on Line 21. My one poll worker gets a W-2 from her town. It's a once or twice a year, couple of hours gig. That hardly counts as self-employment, IMHO. Catherine

Thanks, Paul. I didn't know that would work! Next time I have 500+ transactions, I'll keep it in mind. Catherine

Guilty as charged, and I did it by posting a reply to the note immediately above mine! Catherine

New clients; moved here from Canada, they are resident aliens here on visas. Bought a house here and are deducting mortgage interest & RE tax etc on Sch. A. But they also own a home in Canada, empty and on the market, that they are paying mortgage interest and RE taxes on. Where should these get reported? There is no income, so I can't see how to work Form 1116, the property isn't held for investment, does it all just go on Schedule A? TIA, Catherine

I'll keep that in mind for the future, and thanks. Ended up making a copy of the return FIRST, just in case. Unprotected the D, pasted in the data, and all was fine. But even doing the columns would have been work; this ended up being 507 transactions (yikes!), and the transaction type and filer/spouse/joint columns still would have to have been done by hand, I think. And you can't toggle down with the down button with those two fields; you have to click in the new one. Catherine

A guaranteed way to make a client call! I've even used it successfully a couple of times when I've been waiting for a call before I can go out to do some much-needed errand. However, that trick does not work if you bring the cordless phone with you -- you have to be required to go tearing back up the stairs to grab it, breathless, before the answering machine does. Sympathetic magic is rather inconvenient at times! And the fairs around here don't have cinnamon rolls. But they do have fried dough, fresh and hot and covered in powdered sugar. Yum! Catherine I made it to ATXaholics!!! Is this my 12-step program?

Today we've got cold rain, ~40F, and a NE wind at about 20mph. It's worse just east of us and offshore. Spring nor'easter. They've backed off the forecast of the total rain to expect. A good day to stay inside! Catherine

Don't know off-hand who here is from the Fargo area and environs, but best of luck to all. That's quite the Red River flood you're dealing with. We're all pulling for you. Catherine

New clients; resident aliens. Among other items, I have here a 1042-S with income code 29 (Deposit interest, from a mortgage escrow). Where do I report this? Do I just add it as a line item to Schedule B? Haven't come across one of these before. The rest of the return is pretty straightforward. I think. TIA, Catherine

Ah! That makes sense. I was thinking they gave _her_ $100 back. But it still wouldn't have meant that they gave her back 529 plan money -- she put out plenty that she'd earned for various lab fees and books and all kinds of stuff. Thanks. Catherine

If we eat like we talk, NONE of us will have "petite buns" of any kind!! I've been planning on working in my garden starting 4/16 -- but I now find myself hoping for a rainy day so I can stay inside and BAKE! Catherine

Widowed client has a daughter in college. Daughter received 1098T and 1099Q. Return in question is daughter's. Amount of scholarship is less than amount in Box 2 of 1098T (and that box has the correct amounts for tuition and fees; it's broken down at the bottom). Remainder of tuition, room, and board is waived due to low income of family plus being local to area. Only thing she needs to pay (besides books) is a relatively small required student services fee, eligible to be paid by 529 plan distribution. Distribution listed on 1099Q was for amount well under the difference between scholarship and tuition/fees total. The form even has the appropriate breakdown between basis and earnings. So, if I have this right, there is _nothing _ here that is reportable on the 1040. Correct? However, at the bottom of the 1098T there are two little notes, Note 1: "Scholarship - College X $100.00" Note 2: "Refund - 100.00" Does this change anything? TIA, Catherine

I never knew that form was there!! Wow, that is going to be super handy on a whole BUNCH of client returns; THANK YOU!

Put in $1? How much can that possibly change anything? This is assuming you want to keep the Schedule C and the associated fixed assets for future years' use. If not, you can print out the asset list for future reference and then dump the Sch. C.

I had to over-ride _the worksheets_ to get it to come out right. And THEN I had to over-ride the form on page 2 where it bounces you off to the worksheets; the required checkboxes would not check! Typical Massachusetts situation: ill-conceived, ill-implemented, ill-presented, and administered by the wrong agency!

Chances are no one else has run into this as there don't seem to be many Mass. folks on the forum. But there is a huge problem with the Mass Sch. HC (the *&^%$ health care proof). Things go fine as long as taxpayers have full-year health insurance. Ran into one a while back that didn't but it was a part-year residence and I over-rode where necessary to make it come out properly and correctly. But now I have a full-year resident who just didn't have insurance. I need eleven separate over-rides to get this bleepity-bleep-bleeping form to work according to instructions. Numbers that are supposed to flow from the Federal form just don't. The jump-to bunny (where it exists) jumps to the right place -- but the numbers don't flow through. And to enter those figures requires an over-ride. Then when I get to the penalty worksheets, I have to over-ride everything in sight! I understand not being able to get every little link right, but for goodness' sake I shouldn't have to over-ride to get the right data in there when they haven't put the links in! GRRRR!!!!!!! Catherine

1. Box 1 only. Adjustment goes on Line 29 of 1040; self-employed health insurance deduction. 2. Dunno off-hand; maybe someone else does. Catherine

I've had a couple of these in the last couple of years, too. Guess I'm luckier than I realized in that the documentation has been reasonably clear (the Hartford and I forget who else; FAQ's online rather than anything sent in the mail). One sum was put into a retirement account (non-reportable), the other had a whopping $25 settlement for legal fees that ended up on Line 21. Not a retirement account, so early distribution wasn't an issue there. Catherine

The "PG" previously referred to actually stands for "Phantom Gourmands" -- all of us drooling over this thread! Speaking of which -- time for some lunch. And look, look!! Only eleven posts away from the next level! Woo-hoo!!

I've got one client who is constitutionally incapable of opening an envelope without tearing the envelope and entire contents to ragged shreds. It's always quite a trip to go through her stuff. And yes, she puts every shredded paper form back into its' shredded envelope! Luckily, she comes early when I still have time to deal. Catherine

I was wondering what the ES was; the estimateds for MA are 1-ES; never noticed the Sch E Summary (although I'm sure I've been there). As to comments above on whether it's the software or other -- last year ATX had the most horrid problem with MA extensions. Once you filed the extension, it coded that extension as the _return_ and then you couldn't e-file the return. It hit _so_ many of my clients and it wasn't until the second-to-last that they came up with a work-around that they told me. (Which was the duplicate the return trick I mentioned earlier.) They also took a _very_ long time to admit it was their fault and not MA. Catherine

A town I lived in, in Central Massachusetts, was one of the last in the state to still have 4-digit dialing (and the old rotary switches, as well -- you could hear them clacking on the line). They lost that and had to go to 7 digits about 1995, just a couple years before I moved to Worcester. Catherine