Facts:
For TY2017, MFJ return is filed with primary (first listed) taxpayer on the return shown as deceased during 2017. Proper election was made to apply over-payment of tax to 2018 tax year.
For TY2018, the surviving spouse now files a Single return, claiming the prior year over-payment as estimated tax on Schedule 5 (Form 1040). (My software automatically deletes the deceased former primary taxpayer and moves the spouse to primary on the single return.)
Eventually, IRS sends notice CP24 explaining that for the 2018 return, the refund was reduced by $2,000 since no estimated payments were made.
I'm assuming this is because the prior over-payment is still sitting in some kind of suspense account under the deceased spouse's SSN (primary on the 2017 return).
Question: Anyone know or think any different? What does the IRS do with unclaimed over-payments when the SSN corresponds to a decedent? Would the only way to have avoided this be to have prepared the 2017 MFJ return with deceased spouse listed as secondary (swapped places with the surviving spouse). This would have required a huge amount of error-prone manual work, of course, swapping "T" for "S" and vice versa everywhere they show up.
For TY2017, MFJ return is filed with primary (first listed) taxpayer on the return shown as deceased during 2017. Proper election was made to apply over-payment of tax to 2018 tax year.
For TY2018, the surviving spouse now files a Single return, claiming the prior year over-payment as estimated tax on Schedule 5 (Form 1040). (My software automatically deletes the deceased former primary taxpayer and moves the spouse to primary on the single return.)
Eventually, IRS sends notice CP24 explaining that for the 2018 return, the refund was reduced by $2,000 since no estimated payments were made.
I'm assuming this is because the prior over-payment is still sitting in some kind of suspense account under the deceased spouse's SSN (primary on the 2017 return).
Question: Anyone know or think any different? What does the IRS do with unclaimed over-payments when the SSN corresponds to a decedent? Would the only way to have avoided this be to have prepared the 2017 MFJ return with deceased spouse listed as secondary (swapped places with the surviving spouse). This would have required a huge amount of error-prone manual work, of course, swapping "T" for "S" and vice versa everywhere they show up.
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