Rollover contribution without a 1099R?

Submitted by John Lerch on Wed, 2019-06-05 14:06

I “moved” IRA funds to a new custodian. I just recieved my 5498 indicating that my account recieved a rollover contribution. However, I never recieved a 1099R from the previous custodian. I called my previous advisor and she told me “you wont get a 1099 because you account was a rollover, not a distribution. All you will receive is the 5498.” She also said the custodian will not be issuing a 1099r. I’ve researched this and it seems patently inaccurate. My questions are 1. Can you have a 5498 rollover contribution without a 1099r ? 2 if not. What should I do considering the custodian wont issue one? 3 could my new custodian have inaccurately characterized a trustee to trustee transfer as a rollover? Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you



Submitted by David Mertz on Wed, 2019-06-05 15:17

  • It seems that your previous advisor explained this to you incorrectly.  Your previous advisor has apparently treated this as a trustee-to-trustee transfer, not a distribution and not a rollover, with payment being made directly to your new IRA, not to you personally.  However, your new custodian has mistakenly reported this as a rollover rather than treating it as a nonreportable trustee-to-trustee transfer.  Ideally you would get the new custodian to correct the Form 5498 to show that no rollover contribution (or any other kind of contribution with respect to this transfer) occurred.  In the absence of a corrected Form 5498, the IRS might question the receipt of a rollover with no corresponding distribution from a qualified retirement account, so be prepared to provide explanation to the IRS if the IRS ever questions the reporting of a rollover.
  • If a payment was made to you rather than to your new IRA, the previous advisor has incorrectly treated this as a trustee-to-trustee transfer and they must issue a Form 1099-R reporting a distribution.  This is the less desirable scenario since a distribution and rollover counts toward the one-per-year rollover limitation.

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