Where do I find the Employer ID Number for military?

[deanwojcik]

I am trying to file my sons taxes for him, however I am unable to find an employer ID number (military) or anything in box 15. How do I find that information he is in CA.

[TeresaM · Accepted solution]

If box 15, State Employer ID, is blank on your W-2, your e-file return should still go through just fine, as long as there are no other errors on your return.  Your state department of revenue will be able to easily identify your employer from their 9-digit federal EIN, so the state ID number is a little redundant anyway, but is still a way that your state tracks employers in their internal state computer system.  The state employer ID number is a bureaucratic convenience for your state's department of revenue; it is not an essential element to the correct filing and processing of a valid personal income tax return (either state or federal).

 If you are receiving an error for box 15, try using the federal ID in that box or if the state requires a particular format, such as ending in XYZ, then enter 99999999XYZ for the number of digits it specifies.

If the error persists , try deleting the form and reentering it.  If you have "copied and pasted" to enter some of the information, it might have spaces or other invisible formatting characters that are causing the errors.  Please be sure there are no extra spaces before the entries or after the entries.  If you have imported into Turbo Tax, perhaps some of the data was damaged in the transfer and is not working properly, even if it looks correct on the page.  Deleting the W-2 and manually entering it should solve the problem.

[migs916]

I put in the EIN in place of the state id and it worked. Thanks 👍🏼

[dtberry20]

this information is wrong. the system will no longer allow you to efile without a state id. if you are military just use the EIN you used originally !

[JohnTittel]

Which EIN would that be? I'm filing my first taxes from the military and my W2 didn't have the state EIN on it

[JohnB5677]

You can use the Federal EIN in the top left corner Box b.

[Carl]

 If the military member's home state is not California, then boxes 15-17 should be totally blank on their military W-2.

If you have numbers in 16 and/or 17 and nothing in box 15, and you use the EIN from box b instead, the tax filer may get audited by mail at some time in the future, by the CA FTB. Can't say an audit will definitely occur. But as bad as CA is hurting for tax money, it would not surprise me at all.