Though I agree with your thinking on this, here's the proper way to handle your situation. Really, the mutual fund is at fault for not sending the check to the IRA properly. Therefore they should have no issue with giving you their EIN so you can report it on your tax return.
From @dmertz:
"If these were the result of mutual funds held in an IRA, ideally the checks should have been made payable to the IRA since the IRA was the owner. However, such payments are sometimes paid to the IRA participant instead and should be deposited into the IRA as a restorative payment or a rollover depending on whether or not they are reported on Form 1099-R as a distribution.
If not deposited into an IRA, the funds are considered to have been distributed from the IRA that owned the mutual funds and should be reported on the tax return as such. If a Form 1099-R was issued reporting this as a distribution, that Form 1099-R must be entered into TurboTax and you must indicate that you "did something else with the money," i.e., you did not roll it over. If no Form 1099-R was issued, you would probably need to enter a substitute Form 1099-R (Form 4852) as if you had received a Form 1099-R reporting a regular distribution from the IRA, subject to ordinary income tax and, if you are under age 59½, to a 10% early-distribution penalty on the taxable amount."
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