sign 401K rollover check?

[Rob Base 2.0]

My old lady did a 401K rollover (we are rolling it over to Vanguard)

The company she left said by company policy they had to send the check directly to her and NOT to Vanguard

They did make it payable to "VTFC TR IRA FBO Wife's Name"  (this is what Vanguard said to have it say)

Question- can we send check like that directly to Vanguard or does she need to sign the back like a regular check deposit?

Thanks

[buystoys]

Call Vanguard to check.  I think you can send it directly to them without endorsing, but they can confirm what they need.  They may also need account information included to allocate it correctly.

[ken a.k.a OMK]

They should never have sent her a check. You don't want to touch the money. Hopefully they didn't take taxes out. But they will tell the IRS about it. Do what Vanguard told you.

[simser]

Feb 24, 2017 21:18:45 GMT -5 ken a.k.a OMK said:

They should never have sent her a check. You don't want to touch the money. Hopefully they didn't take taxes out. But they will tell the IRS about it. Do what Vanguard told you.

This was how my rollover worked, they sent me 2 checks- 1 regular and one Roth- and then I sent it to my company. No taxes, but it had to come to me. And it had that it was to my investment firm, for my account, not to me directly.

To answer the original question, I had to fill out a form when I sent the check in.

[Rob Base 2.0]

thanks all. We are good. I found instructions on the interwebs

investor.vanguard.com/401k-rollover/how-to-roll-over

[beergut]

Feb 24, 2017 21:18:45 GMT -5 ken a.k.a OMK said:

They should never have sent her a check. You don't want to touch the money. Hopefully they didn't take taxes out. But they will tell the IRS about it. Do what Vanguard told you.

As long as the check is not endorsed to you (notice the check said FBO wife's name? For Benefit Of wife's name), there is no issue with you physically touching it.

The big concern with rollovers is to not have it addressed to YOU, because that is a distribution, not a rollover. However, even if you make the mistake of having them address the check to you, you can still open an IRA and put it in there as long as it is within the 60 day window, and it still counts as a rollover.

[nytaxpayer]

She should not endorse.  I have done this, no problem.  She can TOUCH the check, just not endorse it.