• User participation in IDES open testing is voluntary.
  
  
• Any production taxpayer data files submitted to the test environment will not be processed. Do not submit production files to the test environment or test files to the production environment.
  
  
• As you are aware, the public/private key pairs used for encryption for FATCA filings have an expiration date. The IRS Public Key can be downloaded from IDES.
  
  
• As a reminder, when purchasing a new digital certificate or replacing one that is about to expire, IDES only recognizes and accepts digital certificates issued by IRS approved Certificate Authorities (CA). Follow the Upload Digital Certificate instructions found in the IDES User Guide, Publication 5190, beginning on page 33, to upload your new digital certificate. The user guide is available on the IRS IDES Homepage or https://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/international-data-exchange-service. 
  
  
• Test FATCA Reports submitted must conform to the FATCA XML Schema version 2.0. Any files submitted using other than version 2.0 of the schema will generate error notifications.
  
  
• The test environment may be accessed at https://wwwpse.idesgateway.com. You may log in using the same credentials used for production.

Review the revised IDES User Guide, Metadata XML Schema Guide, data preparation instructions, sample test packet and user tips and DocRefID format

• Make sure your e-mail system will accept e-mails from the idesgateway.com and ides-support.com domains.
  
  
• Verify that your alert preferences settings on the IDES enrollment site are configured to receive alerts on all transmissions. Improper settings may result in failure to receive IDES Alerts and Notification errors.
  
  
• IDES only recognizes and accepts digital certificates issued by IRS approved Certificate Authorities listed at https://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/digital-certificates.
  
  
• Review sample code for the data preparation process on GitHub.

• Follow the guidelines for recommended file names. File names are case sensitive and any variation in name, extension, characters or format may cause a transmission failure.
  

  The file naming convention of data packet is composed of a Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) timestamp and the entity ID or GIIN of the sender: UTC_FATCAEntitySenderId.zip. The timestamp format of the UTC is YYYYMMDDTHHMMSSmsZ. For more information, review the IDES User Guide.

• After transmitting a data packet, you will receive one or more of the following:
  • IDES Alerts via email from alerts@idesgateway.com.
  • Notifications via the IDES Gateway. A notification is an IRS-generated data packet that provides status details about a prior transmission.
    
    
• Use IDES Sentinel to review and track all transmission history and reports. IDES Web Monitoring and Web Dashboard tools are found at https://visibilitypse.idesgateway.com/SentinelWebDashboard/login.html.

• SQL Injections
  • Certain characters are restricted from use in IDES and must be removed or replaced with entity references.  See the web page on SQL character restrictions for more information.
    
    
• File size and key encryption
  • Key size must be exactly 32 bytes or 256 bits.  Initialization vector (IV) must be 16 bytes, for a total size of 48 bytes.
  • Encrypt the AES 256 key with the IRS Public Key available at www.ides-support.com.
  • File size is limited to 200 MB compressed.
    
    
• Metadata XML Schema
  • Review the sample metadata and XSD files on the FATCA XML Schema web page.
  • Include your correct FATCA Entity Sender ID or GIIN in the metadata file.
  • Include the metadata file in the final data packet.
  • Include the email address element and detail in your metadata file. After reviewing your FATCA submission, IRBM will send a notification to your email address and authorize the onward transmission to the US IRS.
  • A metadata wizard is also available on the IDES Enrollment site.
  • An explanation of the International Compliance Management Model (ICMM) electronic field-level errors can be found at https://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/fatca-error-notifications.
  • Answers to FATCA Frequently Asked Questions are found at https://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/fatcafaqs.

• If you are unable to log in to the test site or need assistance with enrollment, contact the IDES Help Desk at https://www.ides-support.com/Support.
  
  
• If you need additional information about Data Preparation or other aspects of FATCA reporting please visit the IRS FATCA website at www.irs.gov/FATCA.