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I have been helping my dad with his tax return before the upcoming deadline. He has early signs of Alzheimer's disease which ramped up within the last 2 years. Unfortunately I haven't been knowledgable about his financial information and we didn't have or he lost the copies of the 1099 forms he received. He has different savings accounts and pensions. Luckily I went to H&R block where he had this taxes done last year and they gave me information about what 1099 forms he had last time. I was able to go to each financial institution listed and was able to get a new copy.

However there is one entry which the guy from H&R Block listed which just said

Honeywell International 1099-DIV

As far as I can tell Honeywell is a publicly traded company so this is probably stock that he owns. But I don't have the foggiest idea what to do with this. I would assume that I would have to go to a financial institution to get the 1099 form but I don't have information on that. Where can I go to find out how much he earned from this stock last year? Would my only option be to search through all his accounts to find something that might be stock dividends?

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  • Did he ever work for this company? I did years ago, and still have some of the stock. Note that Honeywell has been involved in a series of mergers so he may have worked for a different company.
    – mhoran_psprep
    Apr 28, 2021 at 19:59
  • @mhoran_psprep He worked for Gulfstream Aerospace mostly before he retired
    – Cave Johnson
    Apr 28, 2021 at 20:08
  • As a crosscheck, if you are authorized as his representative (on Form 2848) you can use Form 4506T to request a transcript of 1099-series and related forms filed to IRS by the payers for up to 10 years, although recent changes (i.e. 2020) may not be available yet. There is also an online version of 'Get Transcript' but I'm prettty sure it doesn't allow a representative.
    – dave_thompson_085
    Apr 30, 2021 at 6:33

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Best place to start is likely by checking in with his bank(s), to see if he also has investment accounts with that institution. This will also be helpful as, aside from the pending tax deadline, you will want to create a record of where all the financial info he has is located. To do this will likely either require his involvement, or a legal Power of Attorney-type document. Now would also be a good time to do that. Difficult though it may be to have those conversations with him, now will be easier than down the road.

Failing that, for this specific item you could potentially reach out to the company for record of shareholder info + dividend record, or you could look through his bank statements to see when dividends were received [check online when they pay dividends, and check his bank for receipts around that week].

In the meantime, I suggest you request an extension with IRS; no reason to put pressure on yourself now. You may need to make a payment if you expect taxes could be owing, but it will give you time to get affairs in order.

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    Side note - HR block might have scanned copies of all documents from last year, and a scan of the dividend statement from last year might give a clue as well.
    – Grade 'Eh' Bacon
    Apr 28, 2021 at 20:28
  • By "reach out to the company", do you mean Honeywell? Would they have information about his stock ownership?
    – Cave Johnson
    Apr 28, 2021 at 21:49
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    @KodosJohnson Yes, modern stock ownership isn't simply based on "who walks an old scroll into the head office at dividend-time", ownership is registered and known. I'll say again - try to find this through his brokerage account (starting by going to his regular bank(s), as that is commonly where people open accounts), as this could reveal not only this dividend info but perhaps other important information.
    – Grade 'Eh' Bacon
    Apr 29, 2021 at 1:00
  • Thanks for the answer. I just called one of the institutions (Fidelity) and talked with them together with my dad. He did have Honeywell stocks but they were set up to be re-invested toward buying new stocks so I am still kind of unclear why that 1099-div was listed. They also told me how to get power of attorney for next time.
    – Cave Johnson
    Apr 29, 2021 at 1:15
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    @CaveJohnson+ nearly all stock held by US individuals this century (and about half the previous one) is held through a broker in 'street name' -- the issuing company and its registrar only know the stock is held by Broker X, and only Broker X's records show the individual 'beneficial' owner(s) (to whom it distributes any dividends). But it is possible to have a holding registered directly if you request and pay for it. Note if he used (a) broker(s) different from his bank(s), which is quite possible, the bank statements might show transfers and/or checks to/from the broker(s).
    – dave_thompson_085
    Apr 30, 2021 at 6:42

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