CCA 200851104: Once a joint return is filed, the door to separate returns has closed

Plain-English summary

A couple filed a joint return. Later, after the filing deadline had passed, the wife filed a separate return of her own. The question put to Chief Counsel was practical: should that later return be posted to her account as an original return?

The answer is no, and the reason is one of the sharpest one-way doors in the filing rules.

Section 6013 is generous in one direction. Spouses who filed separate returns may generally change their minds and file a joint return afterward, even after the due date. There is a mechanism for it and a set of limits. But the reverse is not allowed. Treas. Reg. section 1.6013-1 specifically disallows a separate return made after the due date once a joint return has already been filed. After the deadline, the joint election is locked.

The asymmetry is deliberate. A joint return carries joint and several liability, so each spouse is on the hook for the whole tax. If either spouse could unwind that later by filing separately, the election would be worth little, and the decision could be revisited whenever the joint liability became inconvenient, typically after an assessment or a divorce. Fixing the choice at the due date keeps it a choice rather than an option held open indefinitely.

The email works through the manual as well as the regulation, which is what makes it useful to an account technician. IRM 21.6.1.4.5 says married taxpayers may file separate returns on or before the due date of their original filed joint return, and that claims marked filed after the due date should be disallowed. So the wife's later return should not be posted as an original return under transaction code 150. That code identifies the return of record for the account. Posting her document as one would create a second return of record for a year already covered by the joint return.

One exception is named. Joint filers may file separate returns after the date when the joint election was invalid in the first place, with IRM 21.6.1.4.7 given as the reference. That is the coherent exception rather than a discretionary one. If there was never a valid joint election, there is nothing to be locked into, and the separate return is not a change of mind but the first proper filing.

The email closes by pointing Accounts Management to IRM 21.6.1.4.6 for handling the narrower case where only one spouse asks for a timely filing status change.

This is a clean digital release rather than a scan, so no OCR correction was needed. Kept as released: "a separate return to be made after the due date for filing a return after a joint return has already been filed," with the doubled "after" clauses; "There is one exception that allows joint filers to file separate returns after the date," with "due" omitted; and the regulation cited as "Treas. Reg. 1.6013-1" without a section symbol.

Ruling snapshot

• Question: Should a spouse's separate return, filed after the due date and after a joint return had already been filed, be posted as an original return?
• Outcome: Advice given. It should not be posted as an original return under transaction code 150. Treas. Reg. section 1.6013-1 disallows a separate return made after the due date once a joint return has been filed, and IRM 21.6.1.4.5 directs that such claims be disallowed. The exception, at IRM 21.6.1.4.7, is where the joint election was invalid.
• Key authorities: IRC section 6013; Treas. Reg. section 1.6013-1; IRM 21.6.1.4.5, 21.6.1.4.6, 21.6.1.4.7.

Full text (IRS public release)

ID: CCA-102285-08 Number: 200851104
Office: -------------- Release Date: 12/19/2008

UILC: 6013.02-00

From: ----------------
Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 8:58 AM
To: -------------------
Cc: ---------------------------------------
Subject: Follow up multiple TINs question

After reading Treas. Reg. 1.6013-1 and looking at IRM 21.6.1.4.5, it is clear that the wife’s subsequent MFS return filed after the due date should not be posted as an original return under TC 150 because she already filed jointly with her husband. As we discussed earlier, 1.6013-1 specifically disallows a separate return to be made after the due date for filing a return after a joint return has already been filed with the Service. IRM 21.6.1.4.5 states that married taxpayers may file separate returns on or before the due date of their original filed joint return and all claims marked filed after the due date should be disallowed. There is one exception that allows joint filers to file separate returns after the date. This is when the joint election is invalid. See IRM 21.6.1.4.7. For specific procedures on how AM should handle scenarios where only one spouse is requesting a timely filing status change, AM should see IRM 21.6.1.4.6.

Please let me know if you have any questions --------!

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