Software vendors have received word from the New York Department of Taxation and Finance that they are experiencing delays in sending acknowledgements. They have also indicated that acknowledgements are not processed over the weekend. If your site(s) have outstanding acknowledgements for New York returns, it is likely an acknowledgement will not be issued until next week. No action is required on your end.

Update: 2/12/2020 – Issue 4366 is now resolved.

Update: 2/10/2020 – Issue 4370 has been corrected and is now live. Returns claiming “Tuition and Fees Deduction” can now be electronically filed.

We have two issues reported that we wanted to share on the VITA/TCE Blog. Both are reported as high priority items.

• Issue 4370 – Tuition and Fees Deduction Prompting Erroneous E-file Block: For any returns where the “Tuition and Fees Deduction” is claimed, an e-file block is received requiring that an Educational Institution be added. Educational Institution information is required if claiming the “American Opportunity Credit” or “Lifetime Learning Credit”, but not for the “Tuition and Fees Deduction”. Until Issue 4370 is resolved, returns claiming “Tuition and Fees Deduction” should be held until this is blog post is updated.
• Issue 4366 – Transmission Menu Not Displaying State Return Types: When transmitting returns from the Transmission menu, the “State Type” column may reflect as “No Electronic State” even though a state return type is selected when the e-file was created. As long as an e-file return type is selected in e-file for your state(s) and saved when continuing to Submission page, the state return will be electronically filed as expected.

Wisconsin has released messaging that WI returns rejected for the below reason can be resubmitted on February 11th. This would impact any return where the “Tuition and Fees Deduction” is being claimed.

Reject Code – Category: Schema Validation

The element ‘Additions’ in namespace ‘http://www.irs.gov/efile’ has invalid child element ‘TuitionFees’ in namespace ‘http://www.irs.gov/efile’. List of possible elements expected: ‘FederalDepreciation, FederalCapitalLosses, FederalOrdinaryLosses, WisconsinCapitalGains, WisconsinOrdinaryGains, OtherAdditions’ in namespace ‘http://www.irs.gov/efile’.

2/3/2020 – This was resolved with the update this morning.

We have a high priority issue reported (Issue 4248) regarding future direct debit payment date entries in e-file reflecting as the present day when transmitted to the IRS and/or State Department. For example, if you choose Federal Direct Debit Return Type and choose 4/15/2020 as the debit date, the current date (i.e. 1/31/2020) is being transmitted. If taxpayers are coming to your site and wish to have a future direct debit listed for their return, we advise their returns not be transmitted until this post has been marked as resolved.

Georgia is currently accepting returns.  However, you will not receive return acknowledgements until Monday, February 3^rd.

We will begin sending GA returns today, but you will not receive any acknowledgements until February 3rd.

Update 1:45 pm EST: “Send State Only” and Prior Year e-file (2018 and 2017) are now turned on.

Update 11:15 am EST:  We are currently seeing acknowledgments within approximately 20 minutes.

We have turned on electronic filing for TaxSlayer 2019.  We will be monitoring  how long it is taking to get acknowledgements throughout the day.

We will be turning on prior years (2018 and 2017) and “Send State Only” over the next 48 hours.

11/18/19 – E-filing is no longer available until a To-Be-Determined date in January 2020. Federal and state returns prepared at this time must be paper filed.

1040 MeF Production Shutdown/Cutover Schedule

Shutdown begins on Saturday, November 16, 2019, at 11:59 p.m. in order to prepare the system for the upcoming Tax Year 2019 Filing Season.

What does this mean for you?

You will not be able to electronically file any year return until e-file comes back up at a yet to be determined date in January of 2020.

We received the following message from the Georgia Department of Revenue:

“Georgia is still working to resolve the problems we are experiencing with acknowledgements.”