What Lacerte's summary depreciation schedule leaves out

A new client's prior preparer sends over a PDF. It is a Lacerte depreciation schedule, it runs several pages, every asset is on it, and the totals foot. It looks like a complete record.

For most of what you need, it is. For one specific thing, it is not — and the gap is invisible unless you already know to look for it, because nothing on the page is missing, blank or marked. The information simply was never printed.

Lacerte prints two depreciation schedules, and they are not the same document

Lacerte can produce a detailed depreciation schedule and a summary one. Both list every asset. Both carry description, date in service, cost, method, life and current-year depreciation.

The difference is one column group. The detailed schedule separates prior depreciation into its components:

• prior regular depreciation
• prior §179 expense
• prior special depreciation allowance (bonus)

The summary schedule does not. It prints a single Prior Depreciation figure that is the sum of all three, and the component columns are absent from the page entirely — not zero, not blank. Absent.

Which one lands in your inbox is a function of what the other preparer happened to click. In our sample set of real schedules pulled from court filings, the summary variant is common enough that treating it as the exception would be the wrong default.

Where the combined figure is fine, and where it is not

This is worth being precise about, because the problem is narrower than it first sounds and overstating it helps nobody.

If the client sells a piece of §1245 property and you are computing ordinary-income recapture on that sale, the recapture is measured against depreciation allowed or allowable — the total. A combined prior figure carries that total. For that calculation, nothing is missing.

The components matter in four situations that a printed summary cannot answer:

Business use drops to 50% or less. §179(d)(10) recaptures the §179 deduction when qualified business use falls to 50% or below before the end of the recovery period. The amount recaptured is computed from the §179 taken. A combined figure does not tell you what that was.

State conformity. Many states decouple from federal bonus depreciation, so the state basis of an asset differs from the federal basis by exactly the bonus taken. Reconstructing that difference requires the bonus component on its own.

The destination software recomputes forward. When you import an asset into Drake, Lacerte or ProConnect, the software calculates the current year from cost, method, life, convention and the prior amounts you gave it. Fields the schedule never printed do not become zero because the import form has a slot for them.

§1250 property. For real property, the split between straight-line and additional depreciation drives how the gain is characterised on disposal.

Three things preparers do with the missing columns

Write zeros. The import file has a column for prior §179 and a column for prior bonus, they are empty, and zero is the obvious thing to type. It is also a claim: it asserts the client took no §179 and no bonus on that asset. If they did, the assertion is false, and it is false in a way that surfaces years later on a disposal, in a return that has already been filed.

Split the combined number. Given cost, method, life and in-service date, it is possible to work backwards toward what the bonus probably was. "Probably" is doing a lot of work in that sentence: elections vary, §179 is allocated across assets at the taxpayer's choice, and bonus rates changed several times across the years a schedule spans. A reconstructed number that lands in the return looks exactly like a transcribed one.

Leave it empty and mark it. An empty field preserves the one fact you actually have, which is that the source document did not say. It is the least satisfying option and the only one that does not invent information.

How to tell which variant you are holding

Look at the column headers, not the totals. On the detailed schedule you will find separate columns for prior §179 and prior special depreciation allowance, usually adjacent to prior depreciation. On the summary there is one prior depreciation column and no siblings.

A second tell: if the schedule shows a current-year §179 or bonus column but nothing for the prior years of the same asset, you are almost certainly looking at the summary.

Where the number actually lives

The prior preparer's copy of Lacerte still has the components — they are in the client file, not just on the printout. Three routes exist, in descending order of how likely you are to get an answer:

• Ask for the detailed depreciation schedule instead. It is the same client file and a different print option, which is a smaller request than it sounds.
• Ask for the Lacerte fixed-asset export rather than a PDF at all.
• Reconstruct from the prior years' Forms 4562, if the client has them. Part I and Part II of the 4562 report §179 and special depreciation allowance for the year they were claimed.

If none of those is available, the honest position is that the component is unknown, and a field marked unknown is more useful to the next preparer than a confident zero.

When a combined prior figure is all you have

The question arrives in one form: the schedule shows one prior depreciation number per asset, no prior §179 column, no prior bonus column, and the assets have to be set up in the new software this week. Here is what the document supports at each step, and what it does not.

Try to obtain the missing detail first. The prior-year Form 4562 reports §179 in Part I and the special depreciation allowance in Part II for the year each was claimed (Form 4562 instructions). The prior preparer's asset detail, depreciation worksheets or a state schedule with a bonus addback carry the same split. One of these usually exists.

Enter the facts the schedule does print. Description, date placed in service, cost or other basis, business-use percentage, recovery period, method and convention, and the total prior depreciation. None of these is in question; the summary print carries all of them.

The combined figure is the accumulated total, and it is correct as a total. Every suite has a field for prior depreciation allowed or allowable, and the combined number is exactly that. Entered there, it states what the document states. Publication 946 is explicit that basis is reduced by depreciation allowed or allowable in earlier years, which is the total, not its parts (Publication 946).

The component fields are a different claim. An entry of zero in prior §179 or prior bonus does not say "unknown". It says "none was taken". A split worked backwards from cost and date is a computed figure presented as a transcribed one. The document supports neither; it supports leaving the fields empty and marked.

Where the split matters is a short, specific list. A sale, trade or conversion to personal use of the asset; listed property and vehicles; business use falling to 50% or below; a state that does not conform to bonus or §179; a §179 carryover; AMT or ADS records. An asset that meets none of these, held to the end of its recovery period in a conforming state, never exercises the components.

If it does matter, reconstruct from the source, not from the arithmetic. The prior Forms 4562 are the record of what was claimed and when. Reconstructing from them produces a figure with a document behind it. Reconstructing from cost, date and a table of bonus rates produces a figure with an assumption behind it, and the two look identical in the import file.

Whether a given return is on that list is the preparer's determination. What the schedule can and cannot support at each step is not.

What we do with it

This tool transcribes what a schedule prints. It does not compute, infer or correct.

When we detect a summary variant, prior §179 and prior bonus come back empty and are flagged as not present in the source. That flag blocks the download until you clear it deliberately — the same way an unreadable method or an ambiguous category does. We would rather hand you a file you have to think about than one that silently books a zero.

The full mechanics of the Lacerte import, including the two other traps in it, are on the Lacerte Fixed Asset Import page. If you are the one moving off Lacerte rather than onto it, the direction does not change the job — see switching tax software.

Since the document in question is a client's, the retention, redaction and processing-location answers are stated in writing on the security and §7216 page — in the form you would need for a WISP vendor file rather than as reassurance.

FAQ

Does Lacerte's summary schedule split prior bonus depreciation?

No. It prints one combined prior depreciation figure. Prior §179 and prior special depreciation allowance appear as separate columns only on the detailed schedule.

How do I tell which Lacerte variant I have?

Check the column headers. The detailed schedule has separate columns for prior §179 and prior special depreciation allowance; the summary has a single prior depreciation column with no component columns beside it.

Can I enter the combined figure as prior depreciation and leave the components at zero?

The combined figure is the correct total, so entering it as prior depreciation is a transcription of what the document says. Entering zero in the component fields is a different act: it states that no §179 and no bonus were taken, which the document does not say either way. Whether that distinction affects a particular return depends on facts the schedule does not contain.

Does this matter if the client never sells the asset?

The components drive recapture on disposal, the §179 recapture that follows a drop in business use, and state basis where the state decouples from bonus. An asset held to the end of its recovery period with steady business use in a conforming state exercises none of those. The difficulty is that you are deciding today for a disposal that happens on someone else's watch.

Why not just work out the bonus from the cost and the in-service date?

Because the result is a computed figure presented as a transcribed one. Bonus rates changed across the years a typical schedule spans, §179 is allocated across assets at the taxpayer's election, and neither is recoverable from cost and date alone. A number that cannot be traced to a source document is a number nobody downstream can check.