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By the end of each January, PERS mails Internal Revenue Service Form 1099-R for tax reporting to everyone who
received a PERS benefit in the prior calendar year. Forms will be sent to your address on file with PERS. If you
need to change your address, you can fill out the
Information Change Request form or change
your address using
Online Member Services
(OMS).
PERS cannot provide tax advice, but below are some common questions and answers about 1099-Rs as related to your
PERS benefits.
A qualified tax advisor, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), or the Oregon Department of Revenue can help. PERS does not recommend any specific
tax advisors and cannot comment on the taxability of benefits.
IRS: 800-829-1040
Customer service representatives are available from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday local time (Alaska and Hawaii follow Pacific time).
Assistance via chat and email also is available.
Oregon Department of Revenue: 503-378-4988 or 800-356-4222
7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday Pacific time, but phone lines are closed from 9 to 11 a.m. on Thursdays.
You may receive more than one 1099-R if you received monthly retirement benefits
and any of the following:
Each 1099-R will indicate the reason for the distribution in Box 7.
The meanings of each code are listed on the back of the 1099-R. For example, if you are receiving a
retiree benefit (Code 2 or 7) and a beneficiary benefit (Code 4), you may receive a 1099-R for each separate
account.
If one 1099-R has distribution Code 2 in Box 7 and the second 1099-R has distribution Code 7, this is because you
turned age 59½ in that tax year. One 1099-R is for benefit payments before you turned 59½, and the other is for
benefit payments after. Add the amounts from the two 1099-Rs together for an annual total.
Your benefit amount exceeded what could be paid out of a qualified plan under Internal Revenue Code (IRC). You are
receiving part of your monthly benefit from the Benefit Equalization Fund (BEF). BEF payments are reported as
earnings on the W-2.
PERS Health Insurance premium information is not required on the 1099-R. You may contact PERS Health Insurance at
800-768-7377 or (503-224-7377 in Portland) for a health insurance premium statement.
PERS does not have enough information to determine a “taxable amount,” but a tax advisor can help. The tax advisor
might need the amount of after-tax dollars in your account at retirement. This amount may be incomplete because
employers were not required to report the after-tax status of PERS contributions until 1992, when the 1099-R
replaced the W-2P form.
It is the part of your retirement benefit that was paid back to you with after-tax money, like a “non-taxable”
amount. This money could have originated from after-tax contributions or from after-tax purchases at retirement.
Funds received by trustee-to-trustee transfer are not included in this amount because these funds are pre-tax.
It is a unique number based on your PERS number that is used for 1099-R reporting purposes. Your Social Security
number is located in the lower right corner.
PERS will report the rollover amount in a 1099-R with Code G to indicate it was a direct rollover.
Separate 1099-R forms are issued to each payee showing the amount received by the payee. Based on the divorce decree
of some accounts, a member may be responsible for the taxes on the alternate payee benefits; if that is the case,
PERS does not issue a 1099-R to the alternate payee, and all benefits are reported on the member’s 1099-R. Child
support and IRS liens are included in the amount reported in Box 1 of the 1099-R.
The information is reported in the same way it was reported when the member was alive, i.e., as on previous years’
1099-Rs. Please consult a tax advisor if you have questions about a death benefit with Code 4, which may have
different taxability rules than a normal retirement benefit.
1099-Rs are sent by the end of January to the deceased member’s address on file as of December 31 of the tax year.
It cannot be mailed earlier.
If you need a duplicate copy of a deceased member’s 1099-R, please call PERS Member Services at 888-320-7377 or
write to PERS at P.O. Box 23700, Tigard, OR 97281-3700. You may need legal documentation depending on your
relationship to the deceased member.