What do you do if you did not receive a W2 or a W-2 form or a 1099 form?

Answer 1

These Forms are required to be sent by every/any employer or reporter by January 31st of the year. Giving a few days for delivery makes sense. There is no obligation for them to be done earlier, although some companies do. There is no standard for how an employer will process and send them, (or when), and it is simply a matter of internal operations, accounting schedule, computer availability...printer not running out of ink in the middle of the job, etc. The official process for handling non-receipt is below:

If you do not receive your Form W-2 or Form 1099-R by January 31st , or your information is incorrect, contact your employer/payer.

If you do not receive the missing or corrected form by February 14th from your employer/payer, you may call the IRS at 1-800-829-1040 for assistance. You must provide your name, address (including zip code), phone number, Social Security Number, dates of employment, your employer/payer's name, address (including zip code), and phone number. The IRS will contact the employer/payer for you and request the missing form. IRS will also send you a Form 4852 (PDF), Substitute for Form W-2 or Form 1099-R (see Related Link below).

If you do not receive the missing form in sufficient time to file your tax return timely, you may use the Form 4852. If you receive the missing or corrected Form W-2 or Form 1099 after you file your return and a correction is needed, use Form 1040X (PDF), Amended U.S. Individual Income Tax Return. For additional information on filing an amended return, refer to Topic 308, Amended Returns.

Professional observation: expect this to delay your return processing a bit. However, not doing so will cause more problems and delays than you can imagine, (and likely a "nastygram" from the IRS).

And note anyone suggesting you can make a counterfeit to use from their site should be disregarded entirely. What you send MUST be exactly the same as what your employer provides and what he sends to the IRS. Otherwise, you are up for many, many problems as computers are very good at matching what you reported to what the employer reported.

Answer 2

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