efile reject codes & form field references

[BP.]

The 2009 efile reject codes & form field references:

http://www.irs.gov/efile/article/0,,id=217686,00.html

http://www.irs.gov/efile/article/0,,id=204167,00.html

Nice to have on hand to refer to.

[tilt53]

Thanks, good references.

[erchess]

Now I'm just curious

The IRS states that they wish to encourage electronic filing yet they still in some cases insist that returns which are not wrong on their face must be paper filed. What do they gain by that? I understand for example why only one Sch A is allowed - any more than that on one return would be incorrect on its face. But there is no theoretical limit on the number of rental properties a taxpayer could have particularly when you realize that an apartment building or a trailer park could be split up or reported as one unit. There must be some reason why the IRS finds 500K rental units easier to process on a paper return than electronically but I sure can't think what it would be. Can anyone enlighten me? Perhaps my assumption that eventually all returns will be e-filed and people who mail in returns will get them back with instructions to e-file them is erroneous. But if the IRS is working toward that day then it seems to me that rejecting returns which are not wrong on their face works against that policy.

[DonPriebe]

The IRS states that they wish to encourage electronic filing yet they still in some cases insist that returns which are not wrong on their face must be paper filed. What do they gain by that? ...

The 1040 e-file interface is an old computer system that they are continually patching as the laws change. In the olden days, when you wrote software you had to preallocate dedicated storage for all your variables. The key word here is preallocate. If you coded a program to accept ten line items of non-cash charitable contributions (two 8283s) and fifteen rental properties (five Schedule Es), it could not handle eleven donations and no rentals, even though that took less total storage. It's as if you had twenty six file drawers, one for each letter of the alphabet. You couldn't use the extra space in the "Q" drawer to house the overflow from the "M" drawer.

Modern programming languages allow the computer to dynamically allocate storage to fit the individual set of data. The IRS already has a modern e-file interface (MeF) in place for many business returns. I would expect that the current arbitrary restrictions would go away after the 1040 processing is converted to MeF.

{I don't even have a Fortran compiler on this PC}

[outwest]

Nice explanation Don..

Side note: To my amazement, I ran into a guy this fall that still sells COBOL program compilers. I thought that language was gone in the mid 90s. And quite a brisk business even now to fortune 500 companies for certain critical applications. Wow..

[erchess]

TYVM Don

Very good explanation.

[Davc]

See this regarding COBOL.

http://www.fcw.com/Articles/2009/07/13/TECH-COBOL-turns-50.aspx

[DonPriebe]

Side note: To my amazement, I ran into a guy this fall that still sells COBOL program compilers. I thought that language was gone in the mid 90s. And quite a brisk business even now to fortune 500 companies for certain critical applications. Wow..

You can tell I was an engineer in my past life since I mentioned FORTRAN instead of COBOL. IIRC, I only used COBOL once in my career - to write a mailing list application for the local Engineers' association.

Like all engineers, I was very frugal. Used the punch cards on both sides.

[luke]

I wondered

whatever happened to some of the other FORTRAN &/or COBOL "programmers"
- this thread sure brings back lots of MEMORIES......

[outwest]

Fortran and punch cards..

was my computer class in college. (Engage way back machine now.) Sick of one economics professor's supply and demand curves homework, I did a program to generate the tables. After I handed in the first printout for my homework, the make work assignments abruptly stopped. Guess he realized it was a lot less effort for me to generate them than he to grade them.

[Lion]

Oldies

Those were the day. Punch cards, hand in your stack through the window to the air-conditioned computer room, stay out in the MI heat, return in a few days for your print outs. But, we made wonderful wrapping paper through the card checkers!