Margaret in Ohio

[Terry D EA]

Margaret,

I finished my CRUT return early this morning with some frustrating difficulties from ATX. This CRUT only required the 5227 form. With that said, form 5227 apparently is not a major return form that global information flows to. As you said, if you delete the 1041 all information about the trust name, EIN, etc disappears and does not get put on the K-1 either. Tax preparer information will not flow nor can you add a client letter w/o the 1041.

I corrected this simply by unprotecting the forms, typed in the information and created a client letter from MS Word. I don't know if it will do any good but I am going to report this to ATX to see if these problems can get worked out for next year. Just thought you would like to know.

Terry D.

[Margaret CPA in OH]

Thanks for the update and confirming my experience, that I wasn't just missing something obvious. I just left the 1041 in the return but didn't print or otherwise use it. I have reported (read: complained) about the letter issue for at least 2 years and, like you, have resorted to a Word letter. But then, I have to create client filing instructions for all the local returns here in Ohio.

I honestly don't want to complain too awfully much about some of these less used things because I have concerns about price increases. And, on the whole, I would prefer having to do a few things myself and pay somewhat less. With the CRUT's, I think the programming just hasn't kept up with the IRS changes but the demand may also have not been at the top of their list. At least the forms (5227) are correct; we just have to figure out how to keep them working together to get the desired result. And so we have done that!