A person who takes money out of an IRA or a workplace plan to roll it into another account has 60 days to finish the move. Some people miss that date because a form sat on a desk, a check went to the wrong address or a financial institution made a mistake. The tax bill that follows can be large, and until now the only formal fix has been a private letter ruling from the IRS.

That is changing on a set schedule. Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service announced on Oct. 22 that a new correction system for IRAs starts May 1, 2027. Does anyone who missed the 60-day window have a formal route, and what stays in place until then?

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A missed 60-day window has cost money for years

The IRS says a person has 60 days from the day a distribution from an IRA or retirement plan is received to roll it over. If the deadline passes, the amount is generally taxable, and a 10% additional tax can apply unless an exception fits, according to the agency’s questions and answers on rollover waivers.

The same page lists three ways to get a waiver of the rule: an automatic waiver, a private letter ruling and self-certification. A private letter ruling is a written decision on one person’s facts, and the IRS page says a $10,000 user fee must accompany every request for one.

What the May 1, 2027 start date brings

The new system is called the IRA Compliance Resolution System, or ICRS. In its Oct. 22 announcement, the IRS says it lets IRA custodians and IRA owners request correction of certain eligible inadvertent failures, including failures caused by service-provider errors. It also sets up a process for plan participants and IRA owners to request waivers of the 60-day rollover requirement.

The release says the ICRS revenue procedure, Rev. Proc. 2026-33, is effective May 1, 2027. The IRS says that “currently, requests for these waivers must be submitted as private letter ruling requests.”

How late rollover requests move over in 2027 and 2028

The move is gradual. The IRS release says that “over the course of 2027 and 2028, these requests will be transitioned to requests under ICRS.”

The revenue procedure gives more detail. For 2027, it allows waiver requests under either route, with a separate revenue procedure for 2027 expected to cover the older one. It adds that “starting in 2028, it is anticipated that requests for such waivers will only be permitted under ICRS.” That language is anticipatory, so the 2028 cutoff is the IRS’s expectation and not a fixed rule.

Until May 1, 2027, nothing about the current process changes. A private letter ruling request remains the formal route for a person who needs the IRS to grant relief.

Who can file, and what the program charges

Rev. Proc. 2026-33 says the applicant for a 60-day rollover failure cannot be an IRA custodian. It must be the IRA owner. An owner also has to be current on income tax filings to use the program, and the procedure recommends that an owner contact the custodian before submitting.

The same document sets a user fee of $3,500 for a regular submission under the program’s correction process for requests filed before Jan. 1, 2028. Fees for later submissions are to be set in a separate revenue procedure. The release does not give a fee for the rollover waiver requests in particular.

The free routes stay open

The IRS release says that “existing automatic waiver and self-certification procedures remain available, at no cost.” These fall under Rev. Procs. 2003-16, 2016-47 and 2020-46. The revenue procedure says they are not affected by the new waiver process.

Self-certification is not a waiver. The IRS rollover page says a person who self-certifies to the receiving institution and later does not qualify can owe additional tax and penalties on audit, and that there is no IRS fee for using the procedure. The automatic waiver has its own conditions, including a deposit within one year from the start of the 60-day period.

The agency also keeps a page on individual retirement arrangements for the broader IRA rules.

Does a missed rollover change the retirement budget before May 1, 2027?

A rollover that falls outside the 60-day window can turn into taxable income in the year of the distribution, and the new program does not start until May 1, 2027. A person waiting on a waiver request still has bills due each month, and the size of any tax bill is unknown until the IRS acts.

Retirement Money Spreadsheets is a set of four workbooks that includes a Retirement Paycheck workbook showing what savings can pay each month and a Retirement Budget that lists every bill, monthly and yearly. Numbers go into the yellow boxes and the math is already done, so a retiree can see how a delayed rollover or an unexpected tax bill would change the monthly picture.

Test a rollover tax hit against the monthly bills with the paycheck and budget spreadsheets →

This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.