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Question

Turbo tax says I must mail Form 8453. 8453 wants me to attach Form 8949. One of my sales on Form 8949 says see attached statement.....do I need to attach a statement?

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
June 7, 2019
6 replies
0 views

Sale included shares where the cost basis was not reported to the IRS. Do I include a copy of my 1099-B? A statement of how a determined cost basis? Just the 8949?

TurboTax Premier Online

AnthonyC

Employee

Yes, the attached statement that you need to send is your Form 1099-Bs (and/or other statement detailing transactions) with Form 8453. Below is a more expansive answer on this topic.

The answer below is going to assume that you choose to use the summary transaction method of reporting your 1099B transactions instead of entering individual sales.

Short Answer: You do not need to mail Form 8949, but you do need to mail your supporting statements, such as your brokerage statements (Form 1099B) and Form 8453.

When you use this summary method of reporting (i.e. you just entered your totals and not each individual transaction), in some cases, the IRS still wants the supporting details sent to them.

Note: In limited situations, you’re allowed to summarize investment sales without providing complete details. If you are summarizing multiple investment sales that are either Box A sales or Box D sales, and there are no adjustments necessary (i.e. Code W for wash sales), then it is not necessary to mail in a statement with further details. Turbotax will tell you this when your sales meet the criteria and will not prompt you to mail any statements.

So, if you are being prompted to mail further statements, Form 8453 says to attach Form 8949, Sales and Other Dispositions of Capital Assets (or a statement with the same information), if you elect not to report your transactions electronically on Form 8949.

When you use the summary method, TurboTax only produces a Form 8949 with the summary totals that you entered, not the individual transactions, so the Form 8949 that is included in your return is NOT sufficient for this purpose. (Though, you can include it with the mailing)

You need to use Form 8453 to mail the brokerage (or other) statements that show the details of your transactions. Statements should include the following items for each transaction (these are usually reported on your Form 1099-Bs😞

Description
Date acquired,
Date sold,
Sales price,
Cost basis,
Gain or loss for each sale,
Sale category based on how the sale was reported to you and the IRS, and
In some cases, there will be an adjustment code and adjustment amount.

NOTE: As discussed above, any sales summaries that include only Box A or Box D sales, and which have no adjustments to gain/loss, do not need to be included on a statement mailed to the IRS.

If you are e-filing your tax return, then mail your statements along with Form 8453 to:

Internal Revenue Service

Attn: Shipping and Receiving, 0254

Receipt and Control Branch

Austin, TX 73344-0254

tapanforce

Do I need to mail these forms after my return is accepted?

Ron1232585

TT Business won't upload my 8453-S. It says it can't find it even though it shows attached.

vdk

I see the cost basis is reported on the form, but turbotax still says there is missing info and I should send form 1099B. I don't understand why

drennman

Employee

I am confused. Many of the answers as to why Form 8453 requesting Form 8949 relate to:

1. Individuals who did not enter their detailed transactions on Form 8949 and used the Schedule D "summary option." OK so the IRS wants to see Form 8949 or "a statement with the same information" which like some of the answers say is a copy of your 1099-B. The 1099-B would seem to be "a statement with the same information."

But of course the IRS has already been sent the 1099-B by your broker. Which raises the question as to why you need to send another copy, on paper no less?

But since you could have filed a fully acceptable paper return using the summary option, why does e-filing not allow this?

I did not use the summary option but TT still printed the 8453 instructing me to send the 8949. But since I completed 8949 is it possible that TT did not include the 8949 when e-filing?

Why would I need to send a paper copy of something the IRS already has both on my 8949 and from my broker on 1099-B?

Thanks for clarification.

DaveF1006

It depends. I would go ahead and send a copy of the 8453 along with the 8949 with the complete mailing instructions for compliance reasons. Before you do, go through your transactions to see if you indicated you will enter summary transactions rather than one by one. Also, please review this Turbo Tax link to see if you did not report each transaction on a separate row.

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drennman

Employee

OK, I will send the paper forms as you suggest.

But it is still a mystery to me. I did recheck, as you suggested, that I did not (for some accidental reason) select the option to aggregate some or all transactions. Each TT 1099-B worksheet does allow such an option - aggregate some and report some transaction by transaction.

All my transactions are exactly as reported by the brokerage firm - no aggregations anywhere accidental or on purpose. It's purely transaction by transaction.

Is the 8453 generated by TT? It must be because it's done before the return is e-filed and before the return is accepted by the IRS.

If this is correct, I will guess that TT did so because it got confused over the entry of "various" for "date acquired" which is a 100% valid entry and exactly as the brokerage firm reported it on its 1099-B, though each individual sale is listed line by line. Each with its individual "date sold (never various), proceeds, and cost" even if there were 2 sales of the same stock on the same day (which were not aggregated either).

So my best guess - which is very possibly wrong - is that this is a TT error. This year TT seems to be having problems with the 100% valid and correct entry of "various."

Then I am also guessing that TT did include the 8949 in my e-file package? It just thought "date acquired of various" meant sales transaction aggregation (even though that option wasn't selected)?

Thanks.

jlaker66

Employee

This tripped me up too, so I'm glad I found this thread. I was one click away from my federal e-file, when I decided to do one last sanity check of the return, so I saved it off in a .pdf. I saw the note about having to send paper forms, which I didn't want to do. In my case, I had used the summary option to cover a single sale of one particular stock which was acquired over different purchase dates.

So, I switched away from the summary option, and submitted the 12 different purchases as separate transactions, and then the request to mail a paper form went away. That part all worked good.

What didn't work so good was when I modified that single summary entry to be the first of the 12 separate purchase line items, TT got all confused, and it flagged a bunch of (incorrect) issues at the final re-check. I needed to delete that first entry (formerly summary entry), and re-enter it. Must have been something on that record (not visible to me) that was still tagging it as a summary.

Thanks.

Checkers2

I've just now run into the same problem as everyone else here. I did summarize my brokerage transactions on form 8949, and some of them included data that was not given to the IRS by my broker (it says that on my 1099B). So I understand why the IRS might want more details than a simple summary number.

But my complaint is that the first time I saw any notification of this situation was AFTER I had already e-filed. Couldn't there be a notification/warning about it while entering form 8949 data into Turbotax, which I did weeks ago and assumed everything was ready to file?

And who knows if I'm also supposed to mail the same supporting docs to my state??? (At this point it ain't happening.)

swapnizzle

+1 about warning the users that they will need to print and email their 1099-B if they used the summary method!! This is a big pain.

mark847

TurboTax needs to respond to this: I entered each individual transactions that was Type B or Type E, Basis not reported to the IRS. TurboTax still said that I needed to mail in Form 8453. Why?

mglauner

Check your 'Filing Instructions' page.

You should not have to mail Form 8453 if you entered Type B or E transactions manually. They will be reported on Form 8949 and included in your return.

If you're e-filing, you only need to mail copies of your 8949 along with Form 8453 if:

You entered a summary for one or more sales categories (instead of each individual sale); AND
The sales category for one or more summaries is something other than Box A (short-term covered) or Box D (long-term covered); or
The Box A and/or Box D summary includes adjustments (typically listed in boxes 1f or 1g on your broker statement).

Click this link for more info on Mailing Form 8453 and 8949.

@mark847

chirashi

@mglauner TurboTax Deluxe tells me to mail in Form 8453 with Form 8949's. In easyStep, I entered summary totals for my 1099-Bs, but I see the detailed transactions in the forms 8949 in the printed copy of my return for my records. These details were imported from my brokerages, or entered manually.

1. Do I need to mail all the detailed Form 8949's, or just the ones that are not box "A" or "D"?

2. Since TurboTax has all the detailed Form 8949's, why are they not e-filed? Why do I need to print and mail them in? IRS has a huge backlog of paper returns, and my Form 8453 only adds to that backlog.