Filing a 1099 on an Willing Contractor

[Jeron Crooks]

Hi BP,

Though this is my first post, I’ve been following the BiggerPockets podcast and blogs since I moved to DC 3 years ago — it has really been inspirational and life changing for me. The power of the voices on this platform is priceless.

So to my story, I had contractor who did not provide me with invoices for work performed earlier this year though I’ve been keeping a tally of the total and it was a little over $17k. The work he performed was all inclusive which included the following: materials, labor (which I have receipts) and unofficial subcontracted work (no receipts). All paid to him via cash app with the description of what the payments were for. Long story short, not only did I commit the rookie mistake of paying for the remaining work in advance to the sum of $2.2k of which the work was never finished and no refund provided because of a sob story I won’t delve into.

This gentleman was a foreigner who was legal and had a social security card for working purposes. I know this as in the early months of the time this work was performed, we had a personal finance related conversation and he wanted to see if I could help him with his credit. A midst asking him attempting to login to his credit karma account to articulate his situation he sends me a picture of his social security card without me asking because he had forgotten his password — Funny enough, I told him never to do that again, especially to someone he barely knows.

I really just wanted my work done and was trying to give the guy a shot. I don’t have a W9 from this guy. I found an address by doing a reverse search of his phone number. I have sent him text With no response. I know I have to mail him a copy of the 1099 and show proof of an attempt to get the information to furnish it. Of course he doesn’t want to provide it now. I found a couple of addresses to send the document to and plan to send him a picture of it the receipts of it being mailed and notifying him of the addresses of where I have mailed them. I plan to also send a picture of the 1099 via text as well. Being that the cloud saved this image within our message chain I still have it.

Legally, I just want to verify if there is any liability on my part as he didn’t supply the W9, yet I have his social security number. If I’m not mistaken, aren’t these to be supplied together? I know they have exemptions and I’ve read penalties can be assessed for incomplete forms. I’m concerned of the scenario of it potentially being an incorrect address yet I have a social security number.

Can anyone provide any guidance of how I should approach this scenario? Anyone’s helps would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Jéron