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The exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system updateThe exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system updatePosted Jan 13, 2009 22:35 UTC (Tue) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313)In reply to: The exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system update by ibukanov Parent article: The exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system update
by the way, the IRS has a few different formats of forms that they accept. back in the days of dot-matrix and daisy-wheel printers it was already possible to print forms acceptable to the IRS.
they don't have to be identical to the paper forms (especially in terms of shading, boxes to fill in, etc) they need to be in the right order with the data clearly displayed.
finding out exactly what is acceptable requires talking to the IRS (with the corresponding communications effort), while duplicating the paper forms can be done by anyone (with considerably more technical effort to duplicate things that probably aren't significant anyway)
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The exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system update Posted Jan 13, 2009 23:49 UTC (Tue) by iabervon (subscriber, #722) [Link]
1099s are a bit more challenging than things like 1040s because you have to give the 1099 to the people you paid, and they have to be able to fill in their 1040 based on it. The dot-matrix form is fine for the IRS, but individual taxpayers will be somewhat less happy with it; I've gotten a 1040 in that format, and it's kind of like reading a CSV file, except without any headings, and without the commas. I was able to photocopy it and mail it to the IRS, but I wouldn't have been able to fill out other forms with information from it.
On the other hand, the IRS doesn't even get the 1099s in general, and they've only got a few numbers, so you could probably make a sufficient 1099 in HTML without any particular difficulty.
The exceedingly grumpy editor's accounting system update Posted Jan 15, 2009 18:48 UTC (Thu) by kingdon (subscriber, #4526) [Link]
My last first-hand experience as a payer was in 1999 or so, but from a quick web search the following doesn't appear to have changed. (1) the payer does file a copy of every 1099 with the IRS (the US tax agency), and (2) they need to be on special machine-readable paper, the background of which is printed in red ink. If you just have a few, go to an office supply store, buy said red forms, and fill them out with a pen. If you have more, well, this is why all this discussion of software and so on.
1099 Posted Jan 23, 2009 23:29 UTC (Fri) by dfsmith (guest, #20302) [Link] The IRS will mail 1099 forms to you for free if you order them on their web site. Surprisingly, they're quite efficient. You will need an impact printer or well-limbered hand to fill them out though! (We send out fewer than 20 a year.) I also reviewed the open-source and proprietary accounting programs. I settled on Quickbooks 95 (yes, 1995!) because...
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