How do i get a blank 1099 form

Only use envelopes DW19W or DW19WS with these blank forms.

You can certainly use the Adobe (.pdf) blank 1099-MISC form available from the IRS.gov website to print Form 1099-MISC and give copies B & C to your independent contractors, as well as others to whom you need to legally issue 1099s, such as attorneys, etc.

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1099msc.pdf

However, Form 1099-MISC Copy A, which should be kept by you and then filed along with Form 1096 (summary sheet) to the IRS, is printed with special red ink, meant to be read by optical character recognition equipment.  That red ink won't be able to be printed (duplicated) on your typical office printer (see Copy A of form in the link above for an illustration).

That said, you can obtain compliant Form 1099-MISC blank pages (complete with the special red ink) from most any local office supply store for very little money.  All of the national chains (Office Depot, Staples, etc.) also carry this standard product, with a multi-document packet typically costing between $5 and $10.  You may want to telephone ahead or check their website to verify current inventory, as the product is very popular at this time of year, as you may well imagine.

As a final point, we do need to be especially careful about what we call our employees (W-2) vs. independent contractors (Form 1099-MISC).  The IRS is particularly watchful about this topic because of the related Social Security and Medicare tax issue.  We don't want to confuse the two categories, because doing so can lead to substantial tax and / or legal penalties; and we certainly wouldn't want that to happen.

There are lots of places where you can get blank, red-ink 1099 forms. I get my tax forms from my local library.  If they don’t have the forms on hand, just ask your librarian.  They can easily attain more and quickly.

Your local post office might have the red-ink forms on hand as well but I have never had success with my local post office.

You can order the forms are free by calling the IRS at 1-800-TAX-FORM or 1-800-829-3676.  The forms are free and shipping is free and you receive the forms within a few days. Don’t forget to order form 1096 which is the summary transmittal.

You can download the 1099-MISC form here

www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1099msc.pdf

But its important to remember that the online forms are for informational purposes only.  You can not use them to actually file a 1099 form.  The red-ink forms are scanned by the IRS.  Even if you could print the forms in a red-ink, the official forms use a special red-ink for scanning purposes.  The red-ink that your printer uses is not the same kind of red-ink that the IRS uses to create the 1099 forms.

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Written by: Erich J. Ruth. Published on November 17, 2013.

Erich J. Ruth

Erich J. Ruth provides technical support for National Software which is the parent company for 1099FIRE. 1099FIRE develops and markets a comprehensive range of products that enables any size of business or institution to effectively manage and comply with year-end filing requirements. 1099FIRE is an employee-owned company located in Phoenix, Arizona.

Soo has over 10 years of experience at publicly traded companies and public accounting firms offering tax, accounting, payroll and advisory services to clients in diverse industries, including manufacturing, wholesale and retail, construction, real estate development, banking, finance, and professional and legal consulting. At Pricewaterhouse Cooper, she worked with many foreign-owned companies and advised clients on a broad range of issues, including federal and state tax minimization, determining the optimal structure for new foreign investments, and restructuring and reorganization for existing operations.

Updated 

October 13, 2022

Reviewed by

Reviewed by

Soo has over 10 years of experience at publicly traded companies and public accounting firms offering tax, accounting, payroll and advisory services to clients in diverse industries, including manufacturing, wholesale and retail, construction, real estate development, banking, finance, and professional and legal consulting. At Pricewaterhouse Cooper, she worked with many foreign-owned companies and advised clients on a broad range of issues, including federal and state tax minimization, determining the optimal structure for new foreign investments, and restructuring and reorganization for existing operations.

Updated 

October 13, 2022

Reviewed by

Reviewed by

In general, if you hired a contractor or freelancer and paid them more than $600 in a year, you’re responsible for issuing them a 1099-NEC for nonemployee compensation. In other words, the payer fills out the 1099.

Beginning in 2020,  IRS Form 1099-NEC replaces the non-employee compensation payment reporting on Form 1099-MISC for more than 30 years. All businesses now must issue and file a Form 1099-NEC for non-employee compensation if all of the following conditions are satisfied:

• You made the payment to someone who is not your employee
• You made the payment for services in the course of your trade of business, not products
• You made the payment to an individual, partnership, or other unincorporated entity (payments made to a corporation including an LLC treated as a C or S corporation generally do not need to be reported except for payments to attorneys that are corporations)
• The payments made to the payee were at least $600 or more for the current year

If federal withholding exists on any non-employee compensation payments made to a recipient, you must prepare a Form 1099-NEC to report it even though payments were less than $600.

For the 2020 tax year, Form 1099-NEC is due to the Internal Revenue Service on Monday, February 1, 2021. Copies of Form 1099-NEC are due to recipient individuals or businesses by February 1, 2021 as well.

Contents

• Text Link

How to prepare a 1099

The first thing you need to do to prepare a 1099 is that you make sure you have all the correct information on your contractors or vendors. Vendors should have already filled out Form W-9 and provided it to you when you engaged their services. In other words, having contractors fill out a W-9 should be one of the first administrative tasks you complete after hiring them. A Form W-9 includes their name, address, and social security number (SSN) or Employer Identification Number (EIN). The W-9 also includes their tax filing entity, so you can know if you need to issue a 1099 for those vendors.

Information you need before completing a 1099 is as follows:

• contractor’s SSN or EIN
• the total amount you paid them during the year
• contractor’s legal name
• contractor’s address

Once you’re provided with forms W-9 from your contractors, start filling them out with your federal Tax ID number, the amount of money paid to the contractor, which will be entered in Box 1 under the title “Nonemployee compensation”. If you withheld any pay from your contractor (e.g. backup withholding), you will also need to fill in Box 4 or Box 5 for federal or state income tax you withheld.

The next step as a business owner is to send out the tax forms to the contractor and to the IRS. You must send the form, specifically, a Copy B of form 1099-NEC, to the contractor no later than February 1st.  If you miss this deadline, you will be ending up with paying the IRS penalty for late submission and your contractors will end up paying and filing their taxes late. You will also mail (or electronically file) Copy A of each Form 1099-NEC and form 1096 to the IRS no later than February 1st. A Form 1096 summarizes the totals from your contractor payments and the IRS uses Form 1096 to track every physical 1099 you’re filing for the year. Keep in mind that you retain Copy C for your own records.

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Tips for accurate and efficient Form 1099 reporting

Am IRS tax Form W-9 is used to obtain your contractor’s information such as name, address, taxpayer identification number (e.g. social security number, employer identification number) so that a Form 1099 can be issued. You need to ensure that a Form W-9 is on record for every recipient of a payment.  Additionally, having an accurate information up front will prevent you from amending the 1099 forms due to incorrect or incomplete information. If the W-9 is not received by the time of any payment, 24% for backup withholding must be deducted.

How do I print a 1099

If you have your own accountant or payroll service, you can have them to generate the proper forms and send out these forms. However, if you’re willing to do it yourself, you can use the following options for filling out and issuing a Form 1099.

• You can order physical, blank 1099 forms from the IRS for free, but it may take 10 to 14 business days or longer to arrive -
• here is the IRS.gov link  
• make sure you order 1096 Forms as well.
• You can order physical, blank 1099 forms online or from an office supply store. If you use this kind of online store website, you can actually order other things like envelopes. You can get it with the printing software as well.
• You can use a 3rd-party online service where you fill out the information online and they’ll create a PDF for you. You will still need to print form 1099 out and mail it to your independent contractors, but they will e-file the information to the IRS.

Please be sure that you CANNOT use the blank 1099 forms that you find online.

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Penalties for missing the filing due date

If you don’t file a Form 1099 to the IRS by the deadline, you will pay a penalty depending on how late the payment is in the calendar year. These penalties are:

• $50 if you file within 30 days
• $100 if you file more than 30 days late, but before August 1
• $260 if you file on or after August 1

 The amount will be determined based on when you file the correct information return. If you are unable to file on time, you can request an extension by submitting Form 8809 to the IRS. However, you will still need to provide the 1099-NEC forms to any contractors by January 31.

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Takeaway

Prior to 2020, you either issued or received a Form 1099-MISC if your business hired contracted work or if you were a freelancer.  Starting in 2020, the new Form 1099-NEC has been introduced to only report non-employee compensation income. The due date to file Copy A of Form 1099-NEC with the IRS is January 31 of the following year. If this date does not fall on a business day, the deadline will be the next business day. Similarly, the due date to provide Copy B of Form 1099-NEC to contractors is January 31 of the following year. Some states require you to also file 1099-NEC with the state. There is a penalty if you missed the deadline and it depends on how late the payment is. Check the IRS website for more information.

If you're preparing a Form 1099 tax return yourself, there are several options you can use for filling out and issuing a Form 1099 as discussed above. Please remember one thing that that you cannot use and fill out the blank 1099 forms that you find online. Good luck with generating and issuing your 1099s for the year-end!

Soo Lee, CPA

Soo has over 10 years of experience at publicly traded companies and public accounting firms offering tax, accounting, payroll and advisory services to clients in diverse industries, including manufacturing, wholesale and retail, construction, real estate development, banking, finance, and professional and legal consulting. At Pricewaterhouse Cooper, she worked with many foreign-owned companies and advised clients on a broad range of issues, including federal and state tax minimization, determining the optimal structure for new foreign investments, and restructuring and reorganization for existing operations.

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