Can the 2016 Form 5329 be filed separately to pay the 6% penalty, or does it need to accompany an amended 2016 income tax return? The IRS instructions for this form are not entirely clear:
"Prior tax years. If you are filing Form 5329 for a prior year, you must use the prior year's version of the form. If you don’t have any other changes and haven’t previously filed a federal income tax return for the prior year, file the prior year's version of Form 5329 by itself (discussed earlier). If you have other changes, file Form 5329 for the prior year with Form 1040X, Amended U.S. Individual Income Tax Return."
Re: sentence two in the above quote, I have no other changes, other than that I would need to update tax owed on the original 1040; however, I did indeed already file the 2016 return. I'm just wondering if the corollary to the last sentence is also true, in that, if I have NO other changes, do NOT file Form 5329 with an amended return.
Thanks!
