How to enter W-2 with payroll company's EIN but my actual employer name underneath - will this get rejected?

This is actually pretty common with Professional Employer Organizations (PEOs). The PEO is the legal employer for tax purposes, which is why their EIN appears on your W-2. They handle payroll, benefits, and other HR functions for your actual company. For tax filing purposes, you should enter the information exactly as it appears on your W-2. The IRS systems will be looking to match the EIN with the primary employer name (PEO Company LP in your case) since that's the entity that submitted your tax info to the IRS. Don't worry about your actual company (Actually Company LLC) not being prominently featured - this won't impact your tax return or create any issues with your employment history. The IRS is primarily concerned with matching the EIN to the correct employer name for verification purposes.

Just wanted to share my experience with this! I had the same issue last year with my W-2 showing a PEO and my actual employer. I was so confused until I found https://taxr.ai which analyzes your tax docs and tells you exactly how to enter them. It saved me when I was dealing with this exact PEO situation. The tool scanned my W-2 and explained that the PEO's EIN needs to match for IRS processing, and showed me exactly how to enter everything properly. The analysis also flagged some deductions I was missing! Might be worth checking out if you're running into other tax document confusion.

Wanted to follow up - I tried taxr.ai after seeing this thread and it was super helpful! My friend's staffing agency situation was similar but slightly different from a PEO, and the tool immediately recognized it and explained exactly how to enter everything. It even caught that we were entering the state ID number wrong. Saved us a ton of time trying to figure it out ourselves!

If you're still having trouble with this, you might want to call the IRS directly to confirm. I know getting through to them is almost impossible though. I was stuck on hold for hours trying to sort out a similar issue last year until I found https://claimyr.com which got me through to an actual IRS agent in about 15 minutes. There's a demo video of how it works here: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c When I finally spoke with the agent, they confirmed that with PEO arrangements, you should enter the W-2 exactly as it appears, with the PEO as the primary employer since they're the ones who submitted your tax info with their EIN. The agent was super helpful and made sure I understood exactly how to enter everything.

Just wanted to admit I was wrong about Claimyr. After posting my skeptical comment, I was desperate to get an answer about my PEO situation before filing deadline, so I tried it. I honestly expected it to be a scam, but 20 minutes later I was talking to an actual IRS representative who walked me through exactly how to enter my W-2 with the PEO information. Saved me hours of waiting on hold and stressing about whether I was filing correctly.

I've worked in payroll for multiple companies that use PEOs. Here's the deal - the PEO is your legal employer for tax purposes. They're using what's called a co-employment model. Even though you actually work for Actually Company LLC, the PEO (PEO Company LP) is the entity that's reporting your wages to the IRS under their EIN. When filing, always match what's on your W-2 exactly. The IRS computers are matching your tax return against what the PEO reported under their EIN. Your actual company will still be listed on the W-2, but the primary name should be the PEO.

if ur using TurboTax, u can actually solve this by entering it exactly as it appears on the W-2. i had the same issue last year and the software accepted it fine. dont try to change anything around! if the irs gets something that doesnt exactly match what the employer reported, thats when issues happen

I've dealt with this exact situation! I work for a small company that uses a PEO, and my first year filing taxes with this setup was confusing. The key thing to remember is that the PEO is handling all the legal employer responsibilities - payroll, taxes, workers' comp, etc. - so they're the ones who reported your income to the IRS under their EIN. When I called my HR department about it, they explained that this is totally normal and I should just enter everything exactly as it shows on the W-2. Don't try to rearrange anything or "fix" what looks wrong. The IRS matching system expects to see the PEO's information since that's what was reported to them. Your actual employer (Actually Company LLC) being listed is just for clarity so you know where you actually work, but for tax purposes, the PEO is your legal employer. I've filed this way for three years now with zero issues or rejections.

I just went through this same situation a few months ago! I was so confused when I saw both my PEO and actual company listed on my W-2. After reading through all these responses, I can confirm that entering everything exactly as it appears on the W-2 is definitely the way to go. What helped me understand it better was thinking of the PEO as basically handling all the "back office" stuff for your actual employer - they process payroll, handle tax reporting, manage benefits, etc. So while you show up to work at Actually Company LLC every day, PEO Company LP is the one who cut your paychecks and reported your earnings to the government. I used FreeTaxUSA and it handled the dual-company W-2 format just fine when I entered it exactly as printed. No rejections, no issues. The software even has a help section that explains PEO arrangements, which made me feel better about the whole thing. Don't stress too much about it - this is way more common than you'd think!