The IRS Is Creating a Formal Way to Fix IRA Mistakes. Here's What It Means if You Miss a 60-Day Rollover

A new IRS program gives IRA owners a clearer, cheaper path to fix certain account errors, including a rollover check deposited too late.

What did the IRS announce about IRA mistakes?

On Oct. 22, 2026, Treasury and the IRS created the IRA Compliance Resolution System, a formal program for fixing certain IRA errors. Starting May 1, 2027, IRA owners or their custodians can apply to correct problems such as missed required withdrawals and late 60-day rollovers, usually for a $3,500 fee.

The announcement, IRS news release IR-2026-126, came with two rules. Revenue Procedure 2026-33 sets up the new IRA program, which the IRS calls ICRS. Revenue Procedure 2026-34 updates the long-running correction system for employer plans such as 401(k)s, 403(b)s, SEPs and SIMPLE IRA plans; that update took effect the same day. Congress asked for an IRA version of the employer-plan system in the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022. "Hard working Americans will benefit from these procedures," IRS CEO Frank J. Bisignano said in the release.

Until now, employer plans had a well-worn way to fix errors, but IRA owners mostly did not. If you missed a deadline, your main options were a few narrow free waivers or asking the IRS for a private letter ruling, which is slow and carries a steep user fee.

Which IRA errors can be fixed

According to the text of Revenue Procedure 2026-33, the program starts with an IRA Voluntary Correction Program that covers four kinds of problems:

• Missed required minimum distributions (RMDs), the yearly withdrawals the tax code requires from traditional IRAs once you reach a certain age.
• IRA set-up errors, such as a firm opening the wrong type of account.
• Inherited IRA mistakes, when a beneficiary who isn't a spouse receives money in a way the rules don't allow.
• Missed 60-day rollovers, when money taken out of a retirement account isn't put back into an IRA in time.

The IRS describes the program as a way to correct inadvertent failures caused by service-provider errors, meaning mistakes by the bank or brokerage holding the account. The 60-day rollover piece works differently: the request must come from the IRA owner, or a representative, not from the custodian.

Fixes come with possible relief from penalty taxes. In appropriate cases, the procedure says the IRS will waive the excise tax on missed RMDs and will not pursue the excise tax on excess contributions or the 10% additional tax on early withdrawals, as long as the account is corrected the way the procedure requires, such as returning an improper withdrawal or removing an excess contribution along with its earnings.

What it costs and when it starts

The program opens May 1, 2027. Applications are filed electronically on Form 15443 through Pay.gov, and the user fee for a single submission made before Jan. 1, 2028, is $3,500. Firms correcting the same error for many customers can file a group request that starts at $10,000 for the first 10 owners, plus $250 for each additional owner, up to $50,000.

There is no do-it-yourself version yet. "Self-correction of IRA failures is not available under ICRS at this time," the procedure says. Treasury and the IRS are asking for public comments through Jan. 20, 2027.

For late rollovers, the change happens in stages. In 2027, you can ask for a waiver either through the new program or through the old private letter ruling route. Starting in 2028, the IRS says it expects waiver requests to go only through the new program.

What this means for your wallet

The 60-day rule trips up more people than you might expect. When you take money out of an IRA or a workplace plan, the IRS says you have 60 days to roll it into another IRA or plan. Miss the deadline and the money generally becomes taxable, and if you are under 59½ you may also owe a 10% additional tax. A check paid to you from a workplace plan also has 20% withheld for taxes, even if you plan to roll it over.

Here is an example. Say a 45-year-old leaves a job and takes a $40,000 401(k) check, with $8,000 withheld. A serious illness in the family means the money reaches the new IRA on day 75. Without relief, the whole $40,000 could count as taxable income, plus a possible $4,000 additional tax. A $3,500 correction request would cost far less than that bill, but it still isn't small, and in this case a free option may cover it.

That is why the free options matter, and the IRS says they stay in place. An automatic waiver applies when a bank or brokerage received your money in time but deposited it late because of its own error. Self-certification lets you give the receiving firm a model letter stating that one of the IRS's listed reasons, such as a serious illness in the family, a death in the family, a lost check or a postal error, caused the delay. Per the IRS rollover waiver FAQs, you then generally need to complete the rollover within 30 days after that reason ends. The IRS charges nothing for either, though it can review a self-certification later in an audit.

The simplest protection is to avoid the 60-day clock altogether. A direct rollover, where your old plan sends the money straight to the new account, has no 20% withholding and no deadline for you to track. If you have an old account from a past job, our guide to finding a lost 401(k) walks through tracking it down. If you are near RMD age, our explainer on required minimum distributions covers the timing, and our comparison of Roth and traditional IRAs explains how each is taxed.