New TY 2020 Method for Entering Capital Gains?

[JOFI]

It appears ProSeries is using a new method this year for entering details of stock sales reported on 1099 forms.  In previous years, you could enter the information on a Capital Gains and Losses Condensed Entry Table.  This year, that option is no longer available, and instead you need to use a Form 1099-B Worksheet.

Fair enough:  here's the problem.  With the previous method, if I had a 1099 statement with a large number of transactions, I could simply enter the gross sums for each type of transaction.  If $100,000 of sales for short term covered transactions were reported for fifty individual sales, I could just put down the $100,000 as the gross amount, and not break it out by individual sale.  For the dates of the sales, I could leave those blank so long as I classified the transactions as short term or long term.  (If a 1099 form included different types of sales, I would have to break those out, of course.)  I would then attach a PDF of the 1099 form to the return before e-filing it.  

Under this new method, it doesn't allow me to leave the dates blank.  I can put down "various" for the purchase date, but I cannot do so for the sale date.  This means I will need to list every individual sale, which involves a lot of work.

Any tips here?  Thanks!

[Just-Lisa-Now- · Accepted solution]

Ahhh, I see what you mean.  I guess we just fudge in a date for sale and leave the purchase as various.  Use the Holding period box to designate if its long or short.   Why they try to fix things that arent broken makes me crazy.

[JOFI]

Yes, if there is no fix provided, I would likely just put down 12/31 as the sales date - it won't impact the final tax calculation and I doubt the IRS will care that much.

That said, I don't like putting any false information on a return.  And, as you note, there was nothing wrong with the old approach!

[Just-Lisa-Now-]

Years ago, before I realized you could just use the Long or Short designation, I always fudged in a sales date (I used whatever the last sale date was in the list of stock transactions)....it was never an issue.

@IntuitAustin  is this something that was "by design" or was it a programming oversight that a Sales date must be entered rather than just using the Long or Short  holding period?

[rbynaker]

In prior years if it was all covered with no adjustments you could just enter the totals on Sch D and not attach anything.  Did ProSeries remove the direct entry boxes for Sch D lines 1 & 8?

[Just-Lisa-Now-]

No, I think therye in there somewhere, I never used them though, I like to see the description. Id use an entry like Schwab LT Covered Sales
So if I ever looked back at the Sch D/8949, I could tell where the stock sale came from.

[rbynaker]

I'm sure once the instructions get out of Draft form they'll fix this.  Intuit ALWAYS follows the form instructions, right!  Starting with the last full sentence on page 3:

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-dft/i8949--dft.pdf

Enter the name of the
broker followed by the words “see
attached statement” in column (a). Leave
columns (b) and (c) blank.

[dkh]

I use the direct entry on Schedule D like @rbynaker mentioned.   No need to attach a pdf with this method. See Sched D instructions page D-12 - Line 1a and 8a - Transactions Not Reported on Form 8949.   This is wonderful for those clients with 100's of transactions.