1041 tax return - 199 REIT Dividend Information - Issues with software - possible workaround

[Bear2]

As I have complained repeated to Proseries software and technical people to fix this issue.

Do not expect Proseries to fix it because they don't want to fix it for some reason even though this is an issue.

This is what the issue is on the 2019 1041 tax program form currently.

If you have 1041 tax return for which you have K-1 Form beneficiaries for which you are distributing the the net distributable income to (DNI) then you will have an issue whenever you are inputting in dividend income information associated with BOX 5 199A Dividend Income Information.

What is supposed to happen (and this does happen in the 2018 Proseries 1041 Program) is whenever you put in that information a 199A statement or Statment A information associated with 199A deduction is supposed to come up with each K-1 Beneficiary Form along with a code I at the bottom of each K-1 Form indicating that such a form exists.  Thus for example if you have box 5 199 dividend information of $1000.00 and you have 4 k-1 forms with 25% ownership interest then each beneficiary should get a Statement A 199A form saying you have $250 of 199A dividend information to put into your 1040 tax return in order to get a possible QBI deduction for your client. 

On the 2019 1041 program this does not happen.  And with this recent 1041 update it still does not happen.  And Proseries refuses to fix it for whatever excuses they come up with.

A possible manual fix that I have discovered is if you create a fictious Schedule C form on the 1041 program.  When you do this a Statement A does pop up for each individual K-1 form with the proper allocation of the 199A dividend information that you put into box 5 on the interest/dividend 1041 worksheet.  And then this is the trick.  When you go into the Statement A information for each K-1 form remove the allocated 199A REIT dividend information  and then put the number back in.  The reason for this is because then you remove the Schedule C form but the Statement A for each K-1 will remain intact.  If you don't do it this way then when you remove the Schedule C form then the Statement A form that you have for each K-1 will disappear again.

Then you need to go into each K-1 form at the bottom and then manually put in a code I * STMT information that would normally pop up if the 1041 program was working right.  I would also suggest going into the allocation K-1 worksheet area and then in line 14 Code Z put in the other information area something like - Section 199A Dividend Information and then put in the total amount you put in box 5.  The system will then allocate the 199A dividend information to each K-1 form and put that information in the information area at the bottom of each K-1 form.  Doing this is basically repeating yourself but given how the 1041 program is not working on this issue I would it.

For right now this is the only way to fix this issue because Proserie refuses to fix it.

You pay a lot of money to proseries to do the right thing and when they don't it is very frustrating.

This is an easy software issue to fix and it is pretty bad that a CPA can see these issues and report the issues but nothing happens on the proseries software end of things.  

The other issues are the extreme long wait time to get to any customer tech to explain this. Proseries never had these issues before but waiting between 1 to 2 hours to get anybody and then the people don't help you is not a good look.  Makes you want to go to another software company for tax purposes.

[Frustrated-in-IL]

Thank you so very much for posting this.  ProSeries has to get its act together, and immediately.  Their customer service wait times are disgraceful.  Is it too much to ask to get someone on the phone in, I don't know, 15 minutes?  Do they think we have nothing better to do than wait for them on hold? 

I called in a partnership issue on January 24th and was given a case number.  I have followed up on my issue repeatedly.  Three times so far this issue alone, I have called ProSeries approximately 90 minutes before my next appointment.  After 75 minutes, I finally got someone.  After they verify who I am and log onto my system to see the issue, I now only have a handful of minutes before that next appointment.  You can only keep your customers waiting so long and I eventually have to deal with my client, before I am even able to again fully explain the issue.  It is more than frustrating.  The last call ended with being told I needed to talk to a level 2 support representative.  Guess I will be wasting more time this Monday.

It really appears they just don't value their customers.  Not trying to solve a problem is a great way to lose customers.  I will be exploring my options after April 15th.

At least I now know how to solve this Section 199A problem.  Thank you again.

[taxpro2000]

Thank you for posting this work around...I just posted on your original post (before I saw this) that I was encountering the same issue.