I am unable to fill out a fillable form. There is a cursor in each box of the form, but when I type nothing happens, even after trying to use the Fill and Sign tool. How can I fix this?

[Guest]

The form is an IRS form, if that matters. I need to fill it out for a new employer. When I try to type, there is a cursor, but nothing happens. Any kind of "field" does not appear to be there.

[gkaiseril]

There are many IRS forms. Most are fillable except forms that are samples or require special ink for the form background since the form is Optical Scanned with very old equipment and requires the use of the special ink.

Most current IRS forms are created using LiveCycle or XML and are not usable on mobile devices, iPads, android tablets or smart phones. If you are using a mobile device there are only a few apps that can fil-in forms created with Acrobat.

What form are you trying to fill out?

[Guest]

It is the 1099. When I open it in Adobe Acrobat DC, it says it is fillable.

[gkaiseril · Accepted solution]

The 1099 series of forms require the specisl ink and are not available as a fill-in. Have you read the first page of the form on the IRS site?

[Guest]

I did read it, but it didn't say anything about special ink. Just that some copies of the form are not printable/scannable (probably for that reason). The copy I needed was not one of them, but was all in the same pdf document. Either way, what you said makes sense. Also, I talked to my employer, and it does not have to be typed - I wish they had said that sooner. Thank you for your help.

[gkaiseril]

The form also has had some special rights applied to the form which lock it so Fill and Sign is not available.

You can print out the form and then scan it and open the scan in Acrobat so the rights are removed.

Also you will eventually need to send the information you are distributing with the 1099-xxx to the IRS at year's end.