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So I am attempting to develop a 1095B xml generation utility but I am confused about optional fields. I have read in some places that you completely remove optional fields that aren't used from the xml. Other places say you keep the tags but leave them empty. Any ideas what the answer is here? There is a surprising lack of xml examples for this.

Bill Garrison
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AFAIK IRS requires, that empty fields should NOT be included in a payload.

And here you could find example of XML requests. For both UI and A2A channels:

IRS Composition Guide for 1094\1095 forms

fatherOfWine
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  • So I unmarked this as an answer because it's not safe to mark AFAIK answer as answers in this situation. If you add in an official source that confirms this I will re-mark it as an answer. Thanks! – Bill Garrison Apr 21 '16 at 18:56
  • @BillGarrison Well, it was mentioned in one of their webinars and I do not recall exactly which one. It was a while ago, u c.:) Hope it helps. – fatherOfWine Apr 21 '16 at 19:28
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@BillG, here's a blog with examples: https://blog.boomtax.com/irs-air-test-scenario-xml-sample-files/. I haven't tried them myself though :). In case you are not aware, there are business rules, schema, guides here: https://www.irs.gov/for-Tax-Pros/Software-Developers/Information-Returns/Tax-Year-2015-Schemas-and-Business-Rules-for-Affordable-Care-Act-Information-Returns-AIR. I generated our files based on the documentation there.

If you already have a TCC, try to create a pair of manifest and form files based on the sample files. Make sure you replace the UniqueTransmissionId, SoftwareId, ChecksumAugmentationNum, AttachmentByteSizeNum, and DocumentSystemFileNm values in the manifest file.

rjp
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    To add to @fatherOfWine's comment on which webinar the IRS mentions not to include empty optional fields/elements, please check slides 10 and 11 of the January 2016 Webinar Presentation: https://www.irs.gov/pub/info_return/January%202016%20AIR%20Webinar.pdf Archived webinar presentations are available here: https://www.irs.gov/for-Tax-Pros/Software-Developers/Information-Returns/Affordable-Care-Act-Information-Returns-AIR-Program-Overview – rjp Apr 21 '16 at 22:56
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There are a couple of Known Issues in their Production system in which when an optional field is present in the Form Data, that is causing an error to occur. For Tax Year 2015, they are recommending removing the XML for that optional element from the Form Data file, when that element contains a certain value.

Additionally, there are some optional elements, which are not really optional for Tax Year 2015; again, due to the Known Issues linked above.

Russ
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Which filing year? And is this for a test scenario or for production? For the most part, optional fields are just that: optional, meaning they are not required.

If you're talking about blank fields, and whether to exclude them or include them but leave them blank, the IRS generally requires you to exclude them, i.e. don't include blank fields.

kmoser
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