I recently received a postcard from the IRS announcing that they are no longer mailing out tax forms. They added that if I till wanted them (I do) I should try my post office. Well my post office may have Canadian tax forms, but it certainly won’t have US forms. Yes, I could download and print the forms, but there is the matter of several hundred pages of instructions and I’ll be damned if I am going to do that. Their web page offers no place to write to to ask for printed forms. Can they really do this? Is there any way to get them by mail? I’ve been filling them out for 42 years and never liable for a cent of taxes. The foreign tax credit takes full care of that. It is such a waste for both of us.
You can get them on-line. Unless like me, you don’t have a computer, and mail in all your SDMB posts.
You can still have the form sent to you by mail, the IRS is not going to be automatically sending out hard copy forms to households any longer.
Do you mean you don’t want to download all the instructions or you do want them? Because the IRS web site provides forms by themselves as well as all sorts of different publications with instructions in them. In any case, you only have to print the actual forms.
You only have to print out the tax forms, not the instructions.
But some forms aren’t accepted as a printout – you have to get an actual paper form from the IRS to submit. Like 1099’s, probably the most common IRS document!
The 1099 form is still mailed. That doesn’t come from the IRS, that comes from the brokerage firm.
I mean if you are a small employer who has to provide the 1099s – you have to get actual printed 1099 forms from the IRS (or a office supply company) and complete them, and mail them out.
I think t-bonham is probably thinking of people who have to file 1099s for others. Most small businesses must file 1099s - it’s not just something that banks and brokerage firms have to worry about.
As for the OP… I can’t imagine printing the full set of instructions or even wanting it in a printed form. I’d recommend working with the PDF on your computer screen, where you can easily search for terms, use the table of contents, etc.
However, if you do want to order forms and/or instructions to be delivered by mail: http://www.irs.gov/formspubs/page/0,,id=10768,00.html You can order online or call. It looks like 2010 forms cannot be ordered until after Nov 30.
The first reply did give a web page. I could not find a page on the IRS that allowed you to order by mail, but that one did. They are clearly trying to discourage that.
The instructions for foreign filers are over 200 pages long and if they are too cheap to print and mail them, well so am I. I will wait till Nov. 30 and do that.
Why do you need to print the instructions?
And even if you really want a printed copy, why do you expect us (as the taxpayers) to pay for it? Hmph, talk about entitlement!
Well, still no. A payer of any size may download and mail to its payees the 1099 from the IRS website. However, Copy A is printed in red, and only the official version is scannable, so printouts cannot be filed with IRS. Instead of ordering paper forms, payers are encouraged to file electronically.
Because the IRS has always done it before?
That’s the last reason to continue to doing something. We have to reduce spending everywhere we can.
I’m not arguing about that.
I guess I’m arguing about the meaning of the word “entitlement”. It’s not entitlement for someone to expect the same service he’s recieved his whole life, the same service everyone else has always received. It’s entitlement for someone to expect something extra, just beause he thinks he’s special.
In my opinion.
Well, yes, I could download the 1099 forms, complete & print them, and give them to our employees, but then those downloaded 1099s would not be accepted when employees filed their taxes. That’s hardly a nice thing to do to your employees!
And have you looked at the requirements for filing 1099s online? Fairly easy, if you’re a big company and can just send the IRS a tape from your mainframe computer, like they request. But way, way too complicated for a small business or non-profit organization with just a few employees.
If this weren’t GQ, I’d tell you what I think of your answer. Why do you require a non-resident with no (actually a trivial amount) of US income to file a return. AFAIK, no other country does. Certainly Canada doesn’t. It’s not as though I get any benefit from the US. Now to add insult to injury, they don’t even want to print and send out the form.
A tape from your mainframe? What? The FIRE system is accessed online, via the Web, and there are dozens of vendors for the software used to format the data if you don’t have a tame programmer. That may not be economical for a small payer, but it’s not complicated.
And what employees need to file 1099s? I’ve never filed one – are you withholding Federal Income Tax?
Many small businesses & non-profit organizations have ‘employees’ that are actually independent contractors (often only part-time) who take care of their own taxes. Instead of a W-2, they receive a 1099-Misc form to document their income, and they have to file that with their taxes.
Unless you are withholding federal taxes, 1099 contractors do NOT need to file a copy of the 1099-MISC with the tax return. As a 1099 contractor myself, I’m quite sure of this. The only copy that normally needs to be filed with IRS is Copy A, which you (the payer) file; this can’t be downloaded because it’s printed in a special scannable red ink. The other copies are black, and I’m actually pretty sure that those copies CAN be downloaded, and filed by the recipient with no problem; certainly, IRS Publication 1179 (General Rules and Specifications for Substitute Forms 1096, 1098, 1099, 5498, W-2G, and 1042-S) seems to offer wide latitude. In fact, you can even send electronic copies to your contractors, if they’re set up for it – no need for paper at all.