Retirement tax questions

Leeloo (nice reference by the way).

I am reading your response, thank you, but I’m confused about one thing.

for the sake of simplicity I will round numbers.

let’s say original IRA had $15,000.   Let’s say the amount issued through the check was $13,500. (Original amount -10%).  Which for some admittedly idiotic reason we did not catch through this process.

am I understanding correctly, that the $1500 (10%) Will be credited back by correctly answering the rollover questions? Or is that money gone?

Thank you for your patience in trying to understand.