If you cannot efile then yes, he will have to sign the return (unless you have a POA for that issue) and yes he can sign it from jail.
A tax return cannot be
completed and filed until all Form W-2's and Form 1099's have been received.
Most of those forms will not be available until the end of January.
The IRS receives the forms from employers and other institutions and if
the tax return received does not agree with what is in the IRS systems, the
return will either be rejected outright or will be held for several weeks or
months for investigation.
No returns
will be accepted by TT for efiling before 1/3/17 (or later) and the IRS will not start processing returns
until 1/23/17 so come back in Jan to complete the return but don’t be in
a rush. If you do efile before the IRS starts to officially process returns on
the 23rd your return will sit in a holding pool from which you cannot get your
return back to change anything for any reason. It will be stuck there until the
IRS either accepts or rejects the return. If the IRS accepts the return you
will need to amend it which can take 16+ weeks to process.
The program should list the
forms that are not yet ready and give you the chance to sign up for an email
alert when they are ready. Here is the
availability charts to watch :
Availability chart for the 2016 PERSONAL programs:
https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1908854-forms-availability-table-for-turbotax-federal-products-exc...
Availability chart for the 2016 State programs for the
Personal returns:
https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1908857-forms-availability-table-for-turbotax-state-except-busines...
IRS 2017
efile start date announced :
https://www.irs.gov/uac/2017-tax-filing-season-begins-jan-23-for-nations-taxpayers-with-tax-returns-...
IRS
warns of refund delays for some filers : https://www.irs.gov/individuals/refund-timing
IRS
will not issue PINs this year ... you must have your 2015
AGI or self selected PIN to efile a return via a self prepared program: https://www.irs.gov/individuals/electronic-filing-pin-request
