IRS Written Determinations
Free IRS private letter rulings, technical advice memoranda, and Chief Counsel advice with plain-English summaries and the official IRS release on every page.
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Caregiver's mistaken IRA withdrawal receives rollover waiver
A permanently disabled taxpayer's sister and caregiver intended to cash a non-IRA certificate of deposit to cover medical bills. Overwhelmed by caregiving duties and her own medical problems, the…
Financial institution error justifies late IRA rollover
A taxpayer withdrew funds from an IRA intending to roll them into another qualified retirement account. Before the deadline, he instructed a financial institution to place the funds in an IRA…
Care for a seriously ill parent justifies late plan rollover
A retired employee received a partial lump-sum distribution from a qualified plan and timely rolled over one portion. She intended to roll over another portion, but her elderly mother's worsening…
Conservator's theft justifies late annuity rollover
A taxpayer with dementia held a section 403(b) annuity and could not manage his own affairs. A court-appointed conservator withdrew an amount from the annuity and moved the taxpayer's assets into…
Financial institution's deposit error justifies late rollover
A taxpayer directed a financial institution to place a plan distribution into a rollover IRA. The institution instead deposited the funds into a non-IRA certificate of deposit, and the taxpayer did…
Financial institution error justifies late rollover of withheld amount
A retirement plan participant instructed the plan’s financial institution to transfer his full account balance directly to a Roth IRA. The institution instead withheld state and federal taxes from…
Multiemployer plan receives five-year funding amortization extension
A multiemployer plan requested the automatic extension permitted for amortizing specified unfunded liabilities. The plan submitted the required actuarial certification that it otherwise faced a…
Impermissible SIMPLE IRA transfer may be recharacterized
A taxpayer relied on a financial adviser’s recommendation to combine a traditional IRA with her SIMPLE IRA. The custodian of both accounts transferred the traditional IRA into the SIMPLE IRA even…
IRA rollover waiver denied after missed valuation requirement
An IRA custodian treated property as distributed after the taxpayer failed to provide the annual valuation required to maintain the account. The taxpayer said he learned of the distribution only…
Multiemployer plan receives five-year funding amortization extension
A multiemployer plan requested the automatic extension permitted for amortizing specified unfunded liabilities. The plan submitted the required actuarial certification that it otherwise faced a…
IRA securities were timely rolled over based on actual distribution date
An IRA custodian reported that two securities were distributed on September 12, but its own records showed that the actual distribution occurred on November 20. After difficulties retitling the…
Missing rollover notice supports waiver for taxable plan amount
A retiree received a lump-sum distribution containing both after-tax and taxable plan amounts. She intended to roll over the taxable portion but miscalculated it because the plan did not provide the…
Missing notice supports waiver for unexpected plan distribution
A retiree believed she had already received and directly rolled over her full plan benefit. The next year, she unexpectedly received an additional distribution that was deposited into a non-IRA…
IRA ownership of gold trust shares is not a collectible acquisition
A sponsor asked whether an IRA or an individually directed qualified-plan account could buy shares of a grantor trust whose main asset was physical gold. The IRS ruled that buying and holding the…
Adviser error qualifies for a late IRA rollover waiver
A surviving spouse inherited an IRA that held an annuity and asked a financial adviser to move the proceeds into her own IRA. The adviser mistakenly caused the proceeds to be placed in a non-IRA…
Surviving spouse may roll an estate-paid IRA into her own IRA
A deceased IRA owner had named a beneficiary who died before him, causing the IRA to become payable to his estate. His surviving spouse was both the estate's sole beneficiary and its personal…
Mental incapacity supports a late IRA rollover waiver
A taxpayer withdrew funds from a SEP-IRA to purchase real estate but did not restore the money within the normal 60-day rollover period. Medical and court documentation showed that a mental illness…
Bank deposit error qualifies for a late IRA rollover waiver
A taxpayer took an IRA distribution by cashier's check and told a bank representative to place the full amount in a rollover IRA invested securely. The bank instead deposited the money into a money…
Family medical crises support a late stock rollover waiver
A retirement plan distribution included cash and 10,323 shares of stock. The cash moved directly into a traditional IRA, but the stock certificates were mailed to the taxpayer's home and were not…
Depression supports waiver of IRA rollover deadline
A taxpayer received an IRA distribution shortly after his wife's death and deposited it into a nonqualified account after the normal 60-day rollover period. He intended to roll the money into an…
IRA rollover waiver denied for unsupported account error
A taxpayer withdrew an IRA certificate of deposit and placed the proceeds with another financial institution, which opened a non-IRA certificate account. She said she had told a representative that…
IRA rollover waiver granted only for the traceable amount
A retiree asked the IRS to waive the 60-day deadline for rolling an IRA distribution into another IRA. The receiving financial institution mistakenly deposited the distribution into her non-IRA…
Multiemployer plan receives five-year funding extension
A multiemployer plan requested a five-year extension for amortizing specified unfunded liabilities. Its actuary certified that the plan otherwise would face an accumulated funding deficiency, that…
Five-year amortization extension approved for pension plan
A multiemployer pension plan requested a five-year extension for amortizing eligible unfunded liabilities. Its actuary certified that the plan otherwise would face a funding deficiency, that the…
Hospital pension plan receives conditional funding waiver
A community hospital requested a waiver of its pension plan's unpaid minimum funding contribution because of temporary substantial business hardship. The hospital cited lower patient volume,…
IRA rollover waiver granted after adviser fraud
A taxpayer withdrew her entire IRA on the advice of a longtime tax preparer who falsely claimed professional credentials and recommended moving the money to a non-IRA account. The adviser then…
IRA rollover waiver granted for hospitalization
A terminally ill IRA owner withdrew funds because he and his spouse feared they might need them for medical expenses that insurance would not cover. The money was not used, but he was hospitalized…
IRA rollover waiver granted after stock certificate transfer failure
A taxpayer directed that all assets in one IRA be transferred to another IRA, but the receiving custodian rejected a stock certificate representing former employer shares. The financial institutions…
Publishing company receives conditional pension funding waiver
A publishing company requested a waiver of its pension plan's unpaid minimum funding contributions for the 2013 plan year because the recession had reduced advertising revenue. The company said it…
Rollover waiver granted after former spouse's death
A taxpayer received a retirement plan account under a qualified domestic relations order after her divorce. The plan automatically distributed the account after 180 days, but the check arrived…
Assumption reinsurance preserves life policy tax status
A holding company planned to transfer life insurance contracts from two subsidiaries to an unrelated insurer through assumption reinsurance as it exited the life insurance business. The new insurer…
Taxpayer receives 60 days to recharacterize an ineligible Roth conversion
A taxpayer converted amounts from a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA in 2009 without knowing that joint modified adjusted gross income would exceed the then-applicable $100,000 limit. A financial…
Taxpayer receives 60 days to roll over tax withheld from a plan distribution
An alternate payee received a retirement-plan distribution under a qualified domestic relations order. She timely rolled over the 80 percent paid by check, but she did not replace and roll over the…
Medical hardship supports waiver for a late IRA rollover
An elderly taxpayer withdrew funds from an IRA while she had serious medical conditions and was caring for a seriously ill spouse. She intended to keep the money in retirement savings but…
Hospital receives conditional pension funding waivers for two plan years
A hospital serving a semi-rural community requested waivers of minimum pension funding contributions for plan years ending in 2011 and 2012. It attributed the funding shortfall to a temporary…
VEBA may shift retiree-life reserves to retiree-health benefits without tax
An employer's voluntary employees' beneficiary association held reserves accumulated before 1984 to provide life insurance for union-represented retirees. The employer proposed moving the assets to…
VEBA may shift pre- and post-DEFRA reserves to retiree-health benefits
An employer's voluntary employees' beneficiary association held retiree-life reserves that were mostly accumulated before 1986 but might include later contributions. The employer proposed moving…
VEBA may transfer retiree reserves without losing exemption or triggering UBIT
A collectively bargained voluntary employees' beneficiary association proposed moving assets from a retiree life insurance reserve to a retiree health reserve. The transferred assets would fund…
IRA rollover deadline waived after adviser miscoded transfer
An IRA owner withdrew funds intending to move one amount to one bank and another amount to a second bank through trustee-to-trustee transfers. The first transfer succeeded, but the owner's financial…
Pension freeze and new 403(b) plan do not void funding waivers
An employer with minimum-funding waivers froze defined-benefit accruals for nonunion employees and some union employees while establishing a 403(b) defined-contribution plan for substantially the…
Multiemployer plan gets five-year liability amortization extension
A multiemployer plan requested the automatic extension available for amortizing specified unfunded liabilities. Its actuary certified that without relief the plan would have an accumulated funding…
Former spouse gets rollover waiver after plan gave wrong deadline
A former spouse received retirement plan distributions through a divorce settlement and intended to roll part of the money into an IRA. A plan representative gave her the wrong amount of time for…
IRA rollover waiver granted after institution delayed funds
An IRA owner withdrew funds intending to roll part of the distribution into another IRA within 60 days. Representatives of a financial institution assured him that their proposed arrangement would…
Estate denied rollover waiver for decedent's bail withdrawal
An IRA owner withdrew funds to post bail and died before the 60-day rollover period expired. The estate later recovered the amount from the bail bondsman and held it in a blocked estate account. The…
IRA rollover waiver granted for serious medical condition
An IRA owner withdrew funds intending to reinvest them in a new IRA but missed the 60-day rollover deadline. During the rollover period, he experienced serious physical and emotional health…
First IRA transfer gets waiver, second transfer and earnings denied
An entity falsely represented that it was qualified to serve as an IRA custodian, and an IRA owner consequently directed two distributions into what was actually a non-IRA account. The IRS waived…
Payments restoring embezzled plan assets qualify as restorative payments
An administrator's principal embezzled assets from an employer's profit-sharing plan. Recoveries from financial institutions, a surety bond, and the perpetrator restored part of the loss, and the…
Hurricane Sandy hardship does not support IRA rollover waiver
Hurricane Sandy destroyed the main floor of an IRA owner's home, forcing the family into temporary housing and exhausting their savings. Months later, the owner withdrew IRA funds in anticipation of…
Medical memory loss supports beneficiary rollover waiver
A surviving spouse received a distribution check from her late husband's retirement plan. A severe medical condition caused debilitating effects, including memory loss, and she placed the unopened…
Dementia supports estate's IRA rollover waiver
An IRA custodian closed a man's accounts and mailed distribution checks after giving notice, but vascular dementia left him unable to manage his finances or understand the transaction. His spouse…
VEBA may move life reserve assets to retiree health reserve
A collectively bargained voluntary employees' beneficiary association proposed transferring assets from a retiree life-insurance reserve to a retiree health reserve. The transferred assets would pay…
Failed Roth conversion may be recharacterized late
A taxpayer converted part of a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA in 2009 without being told that the conversion then required modified adjusted gross income below $100,000. The taxpayer's income…
Bank error earns IRA rollover deadline waiver
A taxpayer directed a bank to roll a matured IRA certificate of deposit into a new IRA certificate. The bank instead placed the distribution in a non-IRA certificate and sent no written…
IRA rollover waiver granted only for unspent portion
A taxpayer instructed a financial institution to roll part of an IRA distribution into a new IRA after excluding the required minimum distribution. The institution instead split the intended…
Advisor paperwork error earns plan rollover waiver
A taxpayer received distributions from two retirement plans and took both checks to a financial company within 60 days intending to deposit them in a rollover IRA. The checks were payable for the…
Online application error earns IRA rollover waiver
A taxpayer withdrew funds from an IRA intending to place them in a rollover IRA certificate of deposit at another financial institution. An agent used the institution's online application…
IRA penalty waived, but annuities use different life expectancies
An IRA owner's longtime friend inherited interests in several annuities after litigation with other claimed beneficiaries froze the account and delayed required minimum distributions. The IRS found…
Couple receives rollover relief after receiver mislabels IRA refunds
A married couple held both IRA and non-IRA investments with a financial institution that the Securities and Exchange Commission determined was a Ponzi scheme. A court-appointed receiver later…
Misleading distribution form leads to 60-day IRA rollover relief
An IRA owner asked the custodian to issue a check so she could roll the entire balance into an IRA at a local bank. The custodian instead used a confusing distribution form to open a non-IRA…
Custodian's confusing form leads to 60-day IRA rollover relief
An IRA owner asked the custodian to issue a check so he could roll the entire balance into an IRA at a local bank. The custodian instead used a confusing distribution form to open a non-IRA account,…
What these documents are
- Private letter rulings (PLRs): A taxpayer asked the IRS to rule on a planned transaction before doing it. The ruling shows exactly how the IRS applied the Code to those facts.
- Technical advice memoranda (TAMs): The IRS National Office answering a question raised during an audit or other proceeding.
- Chief Counsel advice (CCAs): IRS lawyers advising their own field staff on how to apply the law.
- Determination letters: Rulings on exempt-organization matters, such as whether an organization qualifies under § 501(c)(3) or a foundation's grant procedures pass § 4945.
- Not precedent, still useful: Under 26 U.S.C. § 6110(k)(3) none of these can be cited as precedent. They remain the best public window into how the IRS actually rules on facts like yours, and practitioners read them for exactly that.