Pennsylvania decedents.

[Floydb4]

In Pennsylvania, how can you get date of death onto the PA40 for a joint return?

[SundayInSalem]

You are probably not able to put in the date of death because Pennsylvania will not let you file a joint return unless the surviving spouse is listed first on the return.

Here's more info from Tax Expert Alumni @IreneS says: Can a Pennsylvania widow file jointly for year spouse died?

[DianeW777]

Pennsylvania (PA) allows joint filing as a convenience. Each taxpayer is taxed individually even on a joint return. In the year of death of a spouse you are allowed to file your return together but separately might be easier.  You can always print and mail your PA return if you want to file jointly.

• PA MFJ with deceased spouse (scroll to MFJ and review the information.

[Floydb4]

Thank you both for the help. What I ultimately determined was that the easiest solution was to follow the rules and recognize they were not required to file a return. Virtually all income was pension/social security and they were outside the requirements to file. Lesson learned to not lose sight of the big picture!

For any others looking for similar information, joint filing was allowed because decedent was in the current year, and no personal representative was identified. My problem was TurboTax has no way to get the information on the return for electronic filing. My best approach would have been to use TurboTax to get all the information in, do the IRS form manually, and file by mail as suggested.

I still do not see how to get filing status and date of death into TurboTax for Pennsylvania forms, but thank you both for the help. It helped get me to where I was going!

[ErnieS0]

You can try e-filing directly on the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue's website using MyPath. There's no information about whether it works for a deceased individual and TurboTax does not support this so it's not something we would look into.