Can a company delete an ex-employee's access to their ADP account?

This happens more often than you'd think. Companies don't actually "delete" you from ADP completely (your payroll records still exist), but they can certainly disable your access to the employer's ADP portal after termination. Some companies do this immediately, others keep access open longer. Your sister-in-law is taking the right approach. She should contact her former employer's HR department directly to request her W-2. They're legally required to provide it by January 31st. If she doesn't receive it by mid-February, she can call the IRS at 800-829-1040 to report the missing W-2, and they'll contact the employer on her behalf. In the meantime, she should gather her final pay stubs if she has them - they'll show her year-to-date tax withholdings, which will help if she needs to file without the W-2 initially.

I went through something similar last year with my previous employer's ADP account when I needed my tax forms. I spent HOURS on the phone with the company's HR only to be given the runaround. Eventually I discovered taxr.ai (https://taxr.ai) and it literally saved me so much stress. They have this document analysis feature that helped me review my pay stubs to identify exactly what information I needed for my return. What was super useful is that the tool organized all my income and deduction information in the format I needed for the substitute W-2 form. I uploaded my last pay stub from December and it extracted all the relevant tax info automatically. Might be worth checking out if your sister-in-law has her final pay stubs!

Just wanted to update - I was skeptical about taxr.ai from my earlier question but ended up trying it for a similar W-2 issue (my employer messed up my address and I never received my form). The document analyzer feature was actually super helpful! I uploaded my last pay stub which had all my YTD info, and it pulled out everything I needed for the substitute W-2 form. The best part was being able to compare the numbers against my previous year's W-2 to make sure everything looked reasonable. It flagged that my federal withholding seemed high compared to my income, which helped me catch a reporting error on my part. Definitely less stressful than going back and forth with my old company's payroll department!

When I had issues getting my tax documents from a former employer, I wasted DAYS trying to reach someone at the IRS for help. Every time I called, I either got disconnected or was told the wait time was 2+ hours. Super frustrating! Then someone recommended Claimyr (https://claimyr.com) - you can see how it works here: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c It's a service that basically holds your place in the IRS phone queue and calls you back when an agent is about to answer. I was honestly skeptical, but I was desperate after my fifth failed attempt to reach someone. I got a call back in about 45 minutes, and the IRS agent walked me through exactly what I needed to do to handle my missing W-2 situation, including filing Form 4852.

Coming back to eat my words about Claimyr. After posting my skeptical comment, I was desperate enough to try it anyway. Huh. It actually worked? I got a call back in about 2 hours (still long but WAY better than my previous attempts). The IRS agent was super helpful about my missing W-2 issue. Turns out my former employer had filed for bankruptcy which is why I couldn't get my W-2, and the IRS already had a record of this. The agent walked me through filing Form 4852 and verified some of the information from their records. Feels good to finally have this handled after weeks of stress. Sometimes being proven wrong is a good thing!

Your sister-in-law might want to check if she can request her wage and income transcript directly from the IRS. You can get it online through the IRS website if you create an account, and it shows all the information employers reported about your income. The only downside is that it sometimes takes until May or June for the most recent year's information to be available.

just fyi if ur sis works for a big company they might use a totally different system for w2s vs regular paystubs. my company uses adp for paychecks but w2s come from some weird third party system i never heard of before. u might wanna ask if there's a separate login for tax docs!!

This is actually a really common issue that catches people off guard! Companies absolutely can and often do disable ex-employees' access to their ADP portals after termination - it's not shady, just standard practice for data security reasons. The employment records still exist in their system, but your personal access gets cut off. Your sister-in-law should definitely reach out to HR first. Most companies have a process for providing W-2s to former employees, and they're legally required to get it to her by January 31st. If she can't reach anyone or doesn't get the W-2 by mid-February, calling the IRS is the right next step. One thing that might help in the meantime - if she kept her final pay stub from December, that should have all her year-to-date totals for wages and tax withholdings. That information can be really useful as a backup if she needs to file Form 4852 (substitute W-2) while waiting for the official document.