What Name Goes on a 1099: Line 1 vs. Line 2 by Entity Type

The name on a 1099 has to be the recipient’s legal name as the IRS has it linked to their Taxpayer Identification Number. What that means in practice depends on how the recipient is organized: for a sole proprietor it’s the individual’s own name tied to their Social Security Number, for a single-member LLC it’s still the owner’s name rather than the LLC’s, and for a corporation, partnership, or multi-member LLC it’s the entity’s registered legal name tied to its EIN. Get this wrong and the IRS matching system flags it, which can mean penalties on the payer and mandatory 24% backup withholding on future payments to that recipient.

Line 1 vs. Line 2 by Entity Type

Every 1099 has two name lines for the recipient. Line 1 is the one the IRS matches against its records. Line 2 is a secondary identifier. The rule for which name goes where turns entirely on the recipient’s tax classification, which you should already know from their Form W-9.

Sole Proprietors

Put the individual’s personal name on Line 1. If the sole proprietor uses a trade name or DBA, that name goes on Line 2. You cannot put only the DBA. For the TIN, use either the individual’s SSN or their business EIN, and the IRS prefers the SSN.¹

Single-Member LLCs

This is where filers go wrong most often. A single-member LLC owned by an individual is a “disregarded entity” for federal tax purposes, meaning the IRS looks through the LLC to the owner. Line 1 gets the owner’s personal name. Line 2 gets the LLC’s name. The TIN is the owner’s SSN or EIN, not the LLC’s EIN.¹ Many single-member LLCs don’t even have their own EIN, because one isn’t required unless the LLC has employees or excise tax liability.²

There’s one exception. If the single-member LLC has elected to be taxed as a corporation or partnership, it’s no longer disregarded. Put the entity’s own name on Line 1 and use the entity’s EIN.¹

Corporations, Partnerships, Estates, and Trusts

Line 1 gets the entity’s registered legal name and the TIN is the entity’s EIN. A multi-member LLC taxed as a partnership follows the same rule, using the LLC’s legal name and EIN. So does an LLC that has elected corporate tax treatment.

Before filling anything in for a corporation, though, check whether you owe a 1099 at all. Payments to C corporations and S corporations are generally exempt from 1099 reporting. The main exceptions are attorney fees and gross proceeds paid to attorneys, medical and health care payments, cash purchases of fish for resale, and substitute payments in lieu of dividends or tax-exempt interest.³ If the recipient’s W-9 shows C corp or S corp status and the payment isn’t one of those exceptions, you have no 1099 to file.

Get the Name from a W-9, Not from a Guess

The recipient’s Form W-9 is the source of truth. It captures the legal name, the tax classification, and the TIN, all certified by the recipient under penalties of perjury.⁴ Collect the W-9 before you make the first payment, not at year-end when you’re scrambling to file.

If a payee refuses to provide a TIN, or you have reason to believe the information they gave you is wrong, you have to begin backup withholding at 24% on their reportable payments and keep withholding until they give you a valid W-9.⁴ The 24% rate is set by statute.⁵

One boundary worth noting: a recipient who isn’t a U.S. citizen or resident alien shouldn’t be giving you a W-9 at all. They provide a W-8BEN (individual) or W-8BEN-E (entity), and their payments generally go on Form 1042-S rather than a 1099. If you get a W-8, the 1099 name question probably doesn’t apply.

Verify the Name and TIN Before You File

The IRS runs a free TIN Matching program through e-Services that lets you check name-and-TIN combinations against IRS records before you send in returns. Interactive matching accepts up to 25 combinations at a time with immediate results. Bulk matching handles up to 100,000 combinations within 24 hours.⁶ For any payer filing more than a handful of 1099s a year, running the list through TIN Matching before the deadline is the cheapest insurance against penalties and CP2100 notices.

The Payer’s Name

The payer information in the upper-left box of the 1099 also has to be a legal name matched to the TIN the payer uses on its own business returns. If you operate under a DBA, the legal name comes first; you can list the DBA underneath so the recipient recognizes the source of the payment.

If a third-party reporting agent files your 1099s, authorize them through Form 8655.⁷ Your legal name and TIN still appear on the form. The agent files on your behalf; they don’t substitute their name for yours.

Penalties When the Name Is Wrong

Wrong name, wrong TIN, or missing information on a 1099 triggers penalties under Internal Revenue Code Section 6721. For returns required to be filed in 2026, the inflation-adjusted amounts are:⁸

$60 per return if corrected within 30 days of the filing deadline
$130 per return if corrected after 30 days but by August 1
$340 per return if not corrected by August 1, or not corrected at all
$680 per return for intentional disregard, or a percentage of the unreported amount, whichever is greater

Annual caps run from $239,000 to $4,098,500 depending on the tier and the size of the business.⁸ Intentional disregard has no cap.

What a CP2100 Notice Means

When the IRS matching system finds that a name and TIN on a filed 1099 don’t line up with its records, it sends the payer a CP2100 notice (or CP2100A if there are fewer than 50 errors). The notice lists each affected payee.⁹

After a CP2100, the payer sends a “B notice” and a blank W-9 to each flagged payee. If the payee returns a properly completed W-9, the problem is solved. If they don’t respond, the payer must start backup withholding at 24% no later than 30 business days after receiving the CP2100.¹⁰

If the same payee shows up on a CP2100 twice within three years, the payer sends a second B notice and backup withholding starts immediately. A new W-9 doesn’t fix a second notice; the payee has to send a copy of their Social Security card for SSN issues, or an IRS Letter 147C confirming the name and EIN for entity issues. Payees who never provided a TIN, or provided an obviously invalid one (fewer than nine digits, contains letters), skip the 30-day grace entirely; withholding starts right away.⁹

Correcting a Name Error After Filing

If a 1099 already went to the IRS with the wrong name or TIN, file a corrected version with the “Corrected” box checked at the top. Which correction path you take depends on what’s wrong:³

Wrong name or TIN only: file one corrected form with the right name and TIN, keeping the dollar amounts unchanged from the original.
Wrong dollar amount, with or without a name error: file two forms, one that zeroes out the original and one that reports the correct amount with the correct payee information.

On paper corrections, do not check the “VOID” box. VOID tells IRS scanning equipment to skip the form, and the correction won’t be processed.³ Electronic corrections follow the formatting rules in Publication 1220 for the FIRE system, or Publications 5717 and 5718 for IRIS.

Fix errors as soon as you spot them. The penalty tiers are built around calendar cutoffs, and a correction filed within 30 days of the original deadline costs less than one-fifth of what the same correction costs after August 1.

1
Internal Revenue Service. General Instructions for Certain Information Returns
2
Internal Revenue Service. Single Member Limited Liability Companies
3
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC
4
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for the Requester of Form W-9
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 U.S. Code 3406 – Backup Withholding
6
Internal Revenue Service. Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) Matching Tools
7
Internal Revenue Service. About Form 8655, Reporting Agent Authorization
8
Internal Revenue Service. Internal Revenue Bulletin 2024-45 – Rev. Proc. 2024-40
9
Internal Revenue Service. Backup Withholding “B” Program
10
Internal Revenue Service. Understanding Your CP2100 or CP2100A Notice