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The TN536 Refund report allows the tax unit to batch together all refunds of a certain type for use in other programs or reporting purposes. This version of the report allows you to update the ACT 7 system with a Distribution Type of IT.  These IT transactions cannot be transferred, but can be loaded into TaxLedge for check writing. Before setting to IT, any on hold (OH) statuses must be removed. Refunds that are not marked as IT cannot be loaded into TaxLedge.  A message appears if the account has other refunds in transit (IT) status. The message gives the total amount of refunds in IT status.

Refunds that are marked as OH cannot be loaded into TaxLedge; this is a convenient way to keep refunds that appeared on the edit run of the report from being included in the final run, which sets the IT status.

Refunds are listed on the TN536 report if the sum of the account no., tax year, escrow unit, remit seq. no., and fiduciary no. is greater than zero.  Refunds are listed on the research (RSCHRPT) report if, for these same refunds that have been identified for the 536, the sum of the escrow by account no., tax year, and escrow unit is less than zero, indicating that the account has been over-refunded. The research report shows the negative amount, while the 536 will show the positive amount by remit seq no. Multiple rows may appear on the research report for the same account no., tax year, and escrow unit if there are refunds due to more than one remit seq. no. However, the same negative value will appear for each of these rows.

The refund report will show the agent number and name if there is a fiduciary request for the year of the refund AND that fiduciary has an 'AG' as the business type on the Fiduciary Master screen; in other words, if the fiduciary is an agent, that information is printed on the refund report.

You can also calculate the interest due on those accounts whose adjustment refunds are not sent within 60 days of the receipt date of the payment that created the refund. Interest accrues at a rate of 1% per month or part of a month, beginning with the month the refund was generated. (See Tax Code Sec. 31.12)

The adjustment refund reports will list a reason in the Refund Reason column.  Deleted accounts, however, do not have a reason listed.  Overpayment refund reports will not list any reason. Both will show the deposit number of the refund.

Before setting refunds to IT, you need to go to the Tax Unit Maintenance screen and, for each escrow unit, set the Refund Type to either OV (overpayment) or RF (adjustment refund). The litigated interest portion of refunds is also set to IT.

 If the payer is 'unknown' , perhaps due to data conversion issues), the current owner's name will be inserted as the refund recipient.

A PDF file and a fixed length file are created when you run this report. See the last step in this process for more information.

Warning: For 60-day interest calculations, you must create a payment in a prior fiscal period using the deposit no. RIyyyyCR where yyyy is the current tax year.  This RI deposit can be closed after taking this payment.   This payment must be taken every year.

Consider these client preferences:

ADJ_REFUND_FROM_FIDO_TO_OWNER: For adjustment refunds due to fiduciaries, if set to CURR, send the refund to the current owner in the refund wizard and when BMI 326 is run. If set to OWNERTOP (the default), send it to the owner at the time of the adjustment unless a refund change recipient has been done (via an RC-type deposit), in which case the refunds goes to the new fiduciary. If sent to N, keep the refund with the fiduciary.

ADJ_REFUND_CURR_OWNER_ADDRESS: This is considered only if a refund is due to the owner (fiduciary number is 0) instead of an alternate payer.  Set this to Y to always select the current owner and address for adjustment refunds (even if the Payment Distribution and Refund Status screens show the refund is due to an earlier owner). If set to N, select the owner at the time of the payment that is being refunded (unless a refund recipient change was done). The default is N. This preference is considered in the refund wizard and when BMI 326 is run.

MOVE_ADJUSTMENT_TO_OWNER: This allows adjustment refunds to move automatically from a fiduciary to the owner if set to Y at the time of the adjustment. If this is set to N, the refund stays with the payer.  

USE_OWNER_ID: Set to N to use the address at the time the payment was made if an address change has occurred since then, but the owner ID is the still the same as when the payment was made. If set to Y and the owner ID at the time the payment was made is the same as the current owner ID, the current address will be used. The default is N.

CURR_ADDRESS_IF_SAME_OWNER:  Set to N to use the owner's address at the time the payment was made if the owner’s name is still the same but the address is now different. If set to Y, the current address is used.  The default is N.  If both USE_OWNER_ID and CURR_ADDRESS_IF_SAME_OWNER are set to Y, the Owner ID preference takes precedence and the current owner's name and address is used.

LITIGATED_REFUND_INTEREST_PAY: This can be set to OWNER to have litigated refunds and their interest paid to the certified owner.  Set this to PAYER to apply these funds to the payer at the time of the adjustment refund.

ESCROW_REFUND_TU: Set the tax unit to be used for escrow payment for the next year's taxes.

REFUNDINT_SOURCE:  Used when calculating 60-day refund interest. Enter the account no. you add to ACT 7 for storing refund interest funds. You must add this account to the Tax Collection System.  If the account is not created, the default account created by the program is named REFINTACNT.

REFUNDINT_TAXUNIT: Enter the escrow unit to be used for storing and retrieving 60-day refund interest funds. ACT recommends that you use either 8003 or 8001 to avoid having negative amounts in the unit. Make sure you have created this unit in Tax Unit Maintenance as an escrow type unit.

REFUND_YEAR_REMITSEQ: As of 7/3/2009, the preference is obsolete. Enter the year of conversion to ACT 7.0.  Beginning with this year, the TN536 (batch menu 326) matches remit seq nos. and fido numbers to determine refunds; prior to this year only remit seq nos. are used to find refunds.

PRINT_REFUND_OWNHIST: enter Y to include name change information; to omit, enter N to omit this information.

[Obsolete September 2019. Use ADJ_REFUND_FROM_FIDO_TO_OWNER] ADJ_REFUND_FIDO_TO_CURR_OWNER:  This is considered only if a refund is due to an alternate payer instead of the owner, If set to Y, send the refund to the current owner/address instead of the alternate payer. If set to N, give the refund to the alternate payer. The default is N.

TC536_PRODUCE_537_EXPORT: Set to Y to generate a 537X file when you run the TC536, batch menu no. 326. This file, placed on the ACT secure FTP site, is needed for batch menu no. 302, Pentamation Refund File. Set to N to not produce this file. Tax offices who use TaxLedge should set this to N.

User Entitlements

The following user entitlements must be set for each user who needs access to the Batch Menu and Batch Request screens. They are part of the Run Batch Processes task.  See Tasks, Entitlements, and Jobs for more information. The user entitlement for each batch menu no. mentioned below must be set to Y for each authorized user. Batch menu nos. default to N when they are added.

BATCH_MENU - access to the Batch Menu to generate the reports.

BATCH_REQUEST - access to the Batch Request screen to see the reports.

To run this report:

1. From the Main Menu, click the Batch Products () button or select Products, then Batch Products.  The ACT Batch Menu will appear.
2. Click on the Refund Report (TC536) line, batch menu no. 326.
3. Press Enter.  The parameter screen for this report will appear.
4. In the Year of Refunds field, enter the year (yyyy) for which you want to run the report.  
5. Enter "0000" for all Jurisdictions or enter a specific tax unit number.

Note: In order to print a refund report for the overpayment unit entered in the client preference  AUTH_REFUND_TU, you must enter that unit (for ex., 8011) in the Jurisdictions field. Otherwise, if you enter an O in the Refund Type field (see step 7), you will get data for the tax unit entered in the OVERPAY client preference (for ex., 8001).

If you have set the client preference CREATE_ADJUSTMENT_RECORDS to N, enter a tax unit number other than one in the 8000 range to see the overpayment or adjustment refunds put in the regular tax units.

6. In the Begin Deposit Date field, enter the starting deposit date for which you want the search for refunds.  For adjustment refunds, this is the deposit date of the RF refund deposit, not the original payment date.
7. In the End Deposit Date field, enter the last deposit date for which you want the search for refunds.  
8. Enter the Refund Type.  The choices are: A (Adjustment), O (Overpayment), L (Litigated Interest), E (escrow) or T (tax unit).  

Notes:  If you enter E, the tax unit that is entered in the ESCROW_REFUND_TU client pref will be used to get data for the report.

If you enter T, you must enter a jurisdiction. If refunds have been put into a non-8000 unit, you must use T and enter the jurisdiction number.  They will not appear on a report run only for adjustments or overpayments.

If you enter L, but have since done a refund change recipient on some or all of the accounts, the report will not include the accounts having the changed recipient.

9. If you want any Name & Address Changes to print out with the report, put a Y in this field.  Otherwise, leave it blank.  Name and address changes for the year of the refund will appear at the bottom of the report.
10. Enter the Minimum Amount for which to search.  Anything under this amount will not appear on the report.
11. Leave 0 in the not used field.
12. If you want a report of only refunds that have put on hold, put Y in the On Hold? field.  If you want a report that does not include refunds that are on hold, put N.
13. In the Sort Order field, choose how you want the report to be sorted - by deposit (D), fiduciary no. (F), account no. (A), owner (O), or appraisal district number (N).

Note:  The Fiduciary sort puts fiduciary numbers in numerical order (so owners will be listed first, since their fido number is '0'), the Deposit sort lists refunds in order of ascending deposit number, and the Account sort lists refunds in order of ascending account number. The Owner sort lists certified owner names alphabetically and ignores the fiduciary name.

14. If you entered L in the Refund Type field, enter the deposit name you created when you ran the Calculate Litigated Refund Interest process in the Deposit (Litigated) field.
15. In the Final Run field, enter Y if you have fully researched these refunds (and possibly received Refund Notice Letter from the taxpayer) and you are ready to change their Distribution Type to IT. See the beginning of this topic for more details.  If you just want to run a report, leave this set to the default of N.
16. In the Calculate Interest field, enter Y to calculate the interest due on those accounts whose adjustment refunds were not sent within 60 days.
17. In the Check Date field, enter the date the refund checks will be written.
18. In the Interest Deposit No. field, enter the deposit number of the transfer deposit that will be created when the 60-day interest is calculated and moved to the taxpayer's account from the account named in the REFUNDINT_SOURCE and REFUNDINT_TAXUNIT client preferences.

Note:  The REFUNDINT_SOURCE account must be added to ACT 7 and the REFUNDINT_TAXUNIT must be an escrow unit (8xxx) into which money should be posted to escrow. Be sure you have created this unit in Tax Unit Maintenance and that you made a payment using the deposit number RIyyyyCR to the account.

After the 60-day interest is calculated and run in update mode (the Calculate Interest field is set to Y), you will see negative and positive amounts in the transfer deposit.

If you are running this process for litigated refunds instead of overpayment refunds, enter the Litigated Refund Interest deposit number, as you did in step. 14.

19. In the Interest Deposit Date, enter the deposit date of the Interest Deposit No. (named in the step above).
20. (3-year write offs only) In the Use Current Owner, Not Pref Settings, field, leave the default of N unless you are working with 3-year writeoff monies and want to use the current owner's address, not that of the original payer. In this case, set this new field to Y to force the recipient of each refund to be the same--in this case, the dummy account entered in the ACCT_2_RECV_CW client preference. If you keep this set to N, any other client preferences your tax office has set for refunds will still be considered. In both cases, all of the refunds will be listed separately on the TN536. For 3-year writeoffs, these refunds can be processed through TaxLedge with one recipient instead of many.
21. Leave the FTP Site Name field set to the name provided (it defaults to what is given in the FTP_DIRECTORY_NAME client preference).
22. Enter a Maximum Amount for the refunds to process or leave this field set to 0 for no maximum.
23. Click Submit Job.
24. Click Yes to the "OK to submit the job?" message.
25. To preview and print your report, see Previewing and Printing Reports.  If you entered Y in the Final Run field, you will see separate entries for the refund and the refund interest; both of them will be marked as IT in the Distribution Type field, visible on the Payment Distribution screen.  After the refund is posted back, the IT status is removed.

A.pdf file and a fixed length file are created when this is run with a Y in the Final Run field. The.pdf file is named REFUNDS.[batch req. seq].pdf and is available in the Batch Request screen.  The fixed length file is available after sending it to your FTP server by using batch menu no. 1602. The Directory name should be usr2/spool/act and the File Name will be  REFUNDS.[batch req. seq], with the batch req. seq. being the same one that is in the.pdf file name.

For El Paso, the file is sent automatically to the ElPaso_PeopleSoft directory on the FTP server. Multiple refunds going to the same address are combined into one row.

A separate report of accounts having negative refund amounts for the year and escrow tax unit is also generated under the name 'RSCHRPT.[batch req. seq.].pdf.  These are accounts that have been over-refunded. These accounts should be researched before entering Y in the Final Run field. They can be put on hold if needed. These are refunds on the tn536 report that will be distributed if you do not put these on hold.

If an account has more than one refund and one of them still has IT (in transit) status, a message will be printed on the TN5336 report.