Invalid Social Security Number

Let me help and guide you in the right direction on how to set up your employee, kerryrynn.

I can see that you've already updated your QuickBooks, but let's download the latest maintenance release. one more time, then update your tax table, too. This troubleshooting will apply critical fixes and resolve common errors or issues you may be experiencing while working in the program.

To update: 

1. In your company file, head to the Help menu at the top bar and choose Update QuickBooks Desktop.
2. Go to the Update Now tab and tick the Reset Update box to remove previously downloaded releases.
3. Click the Get Updates button and then press OK to continue.
4. Once done, close and reopen your QuickBooks to kick off the installation.

See the following article to learn more about the different methods for downloading the maintenance release: Update QuickBooks Desktop to the latest release.

Next, update the tax table version to get accurate rates and calculations for federal and supported state taxes, payroll tax forms, and e-file and e-pay options. After performing these steps, enter the SSN into your worker's profile.

Here's how:

1. Go to the Employees menu then Employee Center.
2. Double-click the employee's name.
3. Proceed to the Personal Info tab to enter the Social Security Number of the employee.
4. Click on OK.

You can obtain more information on how to set up new hires and change their information by visiting the links below:

• Add your new employee to QuickBooks Payroll
• Edit or change employee info in payroll

If you continue to get the same result, I recommend contacting our Payroll Support Team for further assistance. They can assist you on how to input the information for you. 

Here's how:

1. In your company file, go to the Help menu at the top bar and choose Contact Us.
2. Type a brief description of the issue, like, encountering an issue customizing a statement, and select Continue.
3. Sign in to your Intuit account and click Continue and then Continue with my account.
4. If you don't already have an account, make sure to Create a new account.
5. We'll email you a single-use code.
6. Enter it and select Continue.
7. If you have more than one account, select the account you want to use and then Continue.
8. Select to Chat with us or Have us call you.

To learn more about the difference between SSN and ITIN, you can browse through this link: Correct your employee's Social Security number. It covers topics such as SSN verification, and amending W-2s to name a few.

For tools and resources to guide you on how to handle any payroll-related activities, you can visit the Payroll Hub. There, you'll find topics about managing your workers' data, processing payroll forms, and handling tax notices to name a few. 

Fill me in if you have other payroll concerns or questions about adding employees. I'm always ready to answer them for you. 

@Rasa-LilaM 

You didn't answer the question.

The OP is asking why they can't enter 9 zeros as the SSN as QuickBooks has always been allowed, specifically to handle the valid case where the employee has applied for an SSN but hasn't received one.

While the law does in fact require an employer to request an SSN, if the employer finds at some later date that an invalid SSN was supplied or that somehow one was not captured, the employer is ALSO required to file tax forms for the employee - even though they don't have a valid SSN. Also, the law allows for the case where an employee has applied for an SSN but does not have it yet. And, if the employee who applied for an SSN does not yet have it and it is time to file tax forms, they need to be filed anyway. And for the SSN field, the requirement is to print "Applied for" on the W-2. And, the documented way QuickBooks has always done that - for decades at least - is to have the employer enter nine zeros in the SSN field.

The IRS instructions for W-2's read: "If the employee has applied for a card but the number is not received in time for filing, enter “Applied For” in box a on paper Forms W-2 filed with the SSA. If e-filing, enter zeros (000 - 00 - 0000 if creating forms online or [nine zeros unformatted] if uploading a file)."

I think the answer is that Intuit screwed up and made a change to QuickBooks that they shouldn't have made, which has broken this functionality, because you don't even know how the product you're messing with is supposed to work. I may be wrong.

I know all this as I have been doing payroll for many years.  What I don't know is why no one at your organization knows what is and isn't required to prepare payroll reports.  I now am unable to set up an employee for the 1st quarter in order to submit correct payroll reports and, as a result, will have to prepare amended reports for my client.

It is shocking to me that Intuit has made these changes, bot to disallow nine zeros in the SSN field and to disallow more than one employee record with the same SSN, both of which are needed in order to comply with the law. Intuit knew this before, and that is why they specifically allowed for these cases.

Somehow, they felt the need to undo these capabilities, I expect in a sophomoric attempt to help customers comply with the law, not understanding that they've done exactly the opposite:

- Nine zeros in the SSN field is required to handle the "Applied for" case. There is even special code in the W-2 feature to convert nine zeros to "Applied for" for printing, which they'd have seen had they bothered to look.

- Two employees with the same SSN is useful in a couple of cases. One I can remember is when an employee who (for one of several reasons) is not subject to SS and Medicare becomes subject to theses taxes mid-year because their status changes. In this case, the cleanest thing do to is to set up a second employee. If you don't, then (for example) if you run the payroll checkup routine, it will incorrectly "fix" the employee and add the "missing" wages. Also, independently, I think there are issues with the W-2, if I remember correctly. Payroll services like ADP historically had the same issues, and they handled it in the same way: Setting up two employee records for the same person.

Why Intuit would note that QuickBooks very specifically warned users in these cases, but allowed them, and then somehow thought that those that wrote those warning messages were wrong and it would be better to just stop the user instead, I have no real idea. But, to me it seems to reek of incompetence.

Hello there, @kerryrynn.

I've already updated my answer above, and you can follow the troubleshooting steps on how to fix the issue.

You can go back to this thread if you have additional questions or concerns about payroll. I'll help you the best that I can

@Rasa-LilaM  RE: I've already updated my answer above, and you can follow the troubleshooting steps on how to fix the issue.

You did? Already before what? And, it seems you still didn't answer the question.

In asking the OP to update/patch QuickBooks, are you indicating the latest updates have reverted the terrible  changes to the rules around employee SSNs? It's difficult to tell as you don't actually state why the OP should patch QuickBooks related to the issue.

I tried your suggestion - still will not accept [removed] as a valid SSN in the employee set up.  

I appreciate you sharing the results of the troubleshooting methods I suggested, kerryrynn. Let's get you connected to our Payroll Support Team so your issue about entering the employee's SSN is handled on time.

We'll need to look at your payroll setup, particularly the employee's SSN to identify the source of the issue. The process requires special handling since it needs us to access your account.

For security reasons, I recommend contacting our Payroll Support Team for further investigation. Our specialists will also assist you in implementing the permanent resolution once it's available. You can follow the steps I shared above to get the contact details or click here to initiate a conversation with our chat agents. 

If you need to gather more information about your payroll data or workers' information, you can run reports in QuickBooks Desktop (QBDT): Create and manage reports. From there, you'll find resources to handle hold notifications, tax, and withholding reports, to name a few.

Fill me in if you need further assistance while working QBDT or have other payroll concerns. I'll jump right back in to help you. 

I have just spent several hours on the QB chat with support trying to figure this out.  I followed all the steps that were mentioned above.  I even screen shared with the online support so they could see with their own eyes exactly what is happening when entering [removed] or even NNN-NN-NNNN.  Tried every suggestion they offered.  Even ended the conversation with the first rep and initiated a second chat with a new rep with the same result.  The second rep finally admitted that QB was not going to allow me to enter the 12 international staff members who have applied for SS#s but don't have them yet.  She did suggest that I could calculate their NET paychecks, write them their paychecks and then deal with figuring out how to pay the federal government later.    I'm so frustrated I could scream.  I kept telling them that this never used to be a problem in the past and that they need to have a conversation with their "back-end" to re-write the software code. 

Unfortunately, it seems that no one at Intuit has ever actually worked in the payroll field.  I have quite few employers who employ H2A and H2B workers.  Many of those do not have SSN when hired.

I got the latest updates for QB Desktop 2023 today, and the issues with the SSN are still not fixed.

1) You can't enter all zeros as an SSN, which means "Applied For" and prints on the W-2 that way, in order to be compliant, and QB is also designed to handle the case when eFiling W-2's, when I think all zeros are what is filed in this case.

2) You can't have two employee records with the same SSN - whether they relate to one actual person or not.

3) If employees with an all-zero SSN are edited, or (I think) where two employees have the same SSN and you edit one, you can't save changes to the employee without "fixing" the "problem".  This is true even though neither of these things is a problem that needs fixing, but instead is how QuickBooks is designed to work - and to be compliant with the law, which you (Intuit) are now preventing with this new change.

Does it occur to anyone at Intuit that there is a reason the carefully-worded "are you sure" messages for these cases were in the product before the recent changes? Are you so arrogant that you think those that came before you didn't think this through carefully? It seems so.

------------------------

The IRS instructions for W-2's read: "If the employee has applied for a card but the number is not received in time for filing, enter “Applied For” in box a on paper Forms W-2 filed with the SSA. If e-filing, enter zeros (000 - 00 - 0000 if creating forms online or [nine zeros unformatted] if uploading a file)."

And that is what QuickBooks does, in both cases, when the EE has an SSN consisting of all zeros.

When are you going to fix this, Intuit?

Hello,

I have new H2A workers coming next week.  Did you find a work around for this issue?

Hi Ginseng_Gal

Unfortunately I have not.  For employees who have applied for a SSN (H2B), I have had to prepare amended payroll tax reports for my state filings.  For H2A workers who do not have a SSN, I'm not sure what I am going to do at year-end (will probably have to prepare W-2's manually).  

Thank you for your prompt reply.  I may have to get creative to get a paycheck processed for them until they receive their SSN.  Getting them will have to be their first priority when they arrive.

Not happy about this QuickBooks!

There are many of us not happy with QB.

I have been having the same issue as it relates to multiple profiles for one employee.  I have a few employees that are entered twice as they get paid differently for their two pays (board pays and regular employee pay).  The only "work around" I found for this issue is to not enter a social security number at all for one of the employees.  When you do this is gives you the option to say you will update it later and still continue to make and save any changes to each employee profile as needed.  This allows me to have two employee profiles active and to run both pays for each.  I chatted with a QB Pro Advisor who said this is the only work around she has found for the time being as well - or to put in [removed] as the SSN.  She said I will then have to combine the W-2s at year end to capture all income.  I haven't figured out how to do that yet, but it is getting me through payroll processing in the  meantime.  I understand this won't work for you all awaiting SSN for your international employees for W-2 purposes, but it may at least let you process their pay checks in the meantime.

Thanks for the info. While am getting an option to not enter a birthdate QB is making me enter a SSN before I can save an employee's info.

Thanks for getting back to us, @kerryrynn. Let me address your concern about saving an employee's information in QuickBooks Desktop (QBDT) without a Social Security Number (SSN).

Before adding an employee to QBDT, obtaining their information is a necessary step. With the most recent payroll update, the SSN is now a crucial requirement for tax reporting purposes. That said, you'll need to enter a valid one so you can save your employee's details. 

We understand how this process is challenging. At Intuit, we value customer feedback to enhance your QBDT experience. That said, I suggest sharing your valuable input with our software engineers so they can review it and may consider incorporating it in our future product upgrades.

Here's how:

1. Go to Help and click Send Feedback Online.
2. Select Product Suggestion.
3. Enter your feature request, then Send Feedback.

Moreover, we can run several reports in QBDT to suit the requirements of your business. By doing this, we'll be able to take a deeper look at your company's financials, including the payroll taxes and employee contributions.

Keep in touch whenever you need further assistance entering your employee's information. We're always around to help. Take care and have a great rest of the day.

I know that information has to be entered but I don't always have it when I need to process a payroll.  My clients send me their payroll info and sometimes don't have everything to me.  In the past, I was able to process payroll and, then get the info updated before preparing quarterlies.  The changes you have made, with total disregard as to how things actually works, is extremely frustrating.

The following seems to work:

-Change the first digit of the invalid social security number to a 0

- Run payroll

- The following week change it back to a 9

Seems like Intuit will only reject the number prior to the first payroll

Thanks for the info!  My problem is when I haven't received a SSN from the employer or the employee has applied for a SSN.  In the past, as per IRS instructions, we could enter all zeroes and have it print as "applied for".  Intuit has decided that they know better than the IRS and are not allowing us to do that.

@JaeAnnC  RE: With the most recent payroll update, the SSN is now a crucial requirement for tax reporting purposes. That said, you'll need to enter a valid one so you can save your employee's details. 

Well JaeAnn, the thing is, that not how the real world works.  An employer can hire an employee that does not have an SSN. This is a point of the law. That is why QuickBooks used to accept all zeros, so that it can then print "Applied for" on the W-2 and include a nine-zero SSN when electronically filing W-2s, as required by law.

Intuit needs to fix this, and fast, as the end of the year is coming up. If you do not, it's going to be mayhem when W-2's are due and employers can no longer file properly - cannot follow the law. This has been posted here many times. Why don't you listen before it is too late?

I can't even update my current employees wages because it won't let me continue w/out a SSN instead of an ITIN number. So yes, I have been processing my payroll for years this way and now QB has decided to make their own rules to disrupt my flow of business. I don't think that it is up to QB to dictate how we set up payroll and what numbers we use. We send our taxes to the government and it is up to the employee to file. So now my employee can't get a raise.

is there an update to this?  irs says to enter all 0's as we wait.   looks like last comment was 3 weeks ago- anything new?