Warning: Rant on Tax Software

Move along, nothing to see here!
bryan
Posts: 1061
Joined: Sat Nov 29, 2014 2:01 am
Location: mostly Bay Area

Re: Warning: Rant on Tax Software

Post by bryan »

bryan wrote:did both turbo tax and tax act this year (promise I'm not a masochist, though it's no doubt intuit is a sadist). TT actually found me a few hundred extra dollars. Kind of pisses me off they don't match.
Filed with TurboTax this past week. $120. $87 more than TaxAct, but in the end I come out $142 ahead. Spent an extra hour before that trying to find the discrepancy but failed. I have come to consider the QA style UI to actually be a bit of vendor lock in in that I can't just look at the forms or worksheets to compare between vendors (or free paper).

In the end, HSA and IRAs have been a pain for me in 2015 (two excess contributions to two different HSAs; excess contribution to Roth rechar to Traditional). Seems both websites don't handle it very easily (asking ambiguous, too simple questions).

Will either go with TaxAct or by hand for 2016.

RealPerson
Posts: 875
Joined: Thu Nov 22, 2012 4:33 pm

Re: Warning: Rant on Tax Software

Post by RealPerson »

Chad wrote:
Mon Jan 25, 2016 6:09 pm
RealPerson wrote:
Chad wrote:@almostthere
You can get most popular tax software for about $20 during a promotion/sale. That's what I paid for mine this year. This will include federal and one state return. If you want it even cheaper, or you missed the sale, just file an extension and buy the software in August when they are desperately trying to unload it. I have done it a couple times.
That is a good idea. Just remember that filling an extension does not mean you can extend the tax payment itself. Make sure the delay does not cause penalties and interest.
Thanks, I know. I'm a former accountant. :D
I am an expert in giving advice to people who know better than me 😁.

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