I've used Turbo Tax for years, but this time I was convinced it was not calculating correctly. I contacted the call center in Boulder, CO, and spoke to Katie (who is from outside Manchester, England). She stayed on the phone with me until I could download the desktop version and walked me through how to use it. She kept me calm and made the final process so much easier. I still owed, (there was no incorrect calculation on the part of Turbo Tax!) but at least I able to look at the forms and confirm the information. Thanks Katie!!!
Pros: My job status changed this year (switched jobs, lost a job, got a raise or promotion)
Started a new business & filed for an extension as I was confused on preparing my tax return on my own. TurboTax made it as simple as possible & I finished just in time. Thank you TurboTax!!
What's great about it: Interview process
What's not so great: Paying extra to file state
Pros: My job status changed this year (switched jobs, lost a job, got a raise or promotion)
Has been a consistently excellent product for my Home & Business filing of Federal and State Returns for over a decade. Extremely flexible in inputting information - dual option of Step-by-Step and by Form is a great feature - usually use both - gracefully switching back and forth. Highly comprehensive including any and all Forms and Worksheets that I have ever needed. Fast and accurate calculations/recalculations.
Thanks for a great product that makes the onerous tax-filing process doable and bearable.
What's great about it: See Review below
What's not so great: 1. Editing capabilities in Pop-up description sheets - poor; No way to attach Supplementary sheets/files
Seems Turbotax excels if you never used it before walking you through step by step. Where it fails....
If you import from previous year, you can often have 'pieces' of stuff left behind on deductions or income you aren't using in the next year, they assume incorrectly that tax situations never change. And this year was no different with my 'complete' return having a mystery error that resulted from a car without a name, to delete it I had to add a mystery name, fake information then finally i get to the 'delete' button so I had to add to delete. Seriously?
Also this year the drill downs were particularly slow to load and I'm running on a FAST system. The Schedule C needs an overhaul for easier entry especially for the "home and business" edition that should help you calculate the values, and it should have 'calculator' fields to allow you to split values (e.g. total cost of sales is XXXX, and then as you split it up it should insure that each section adds up to your financial sheet total) same for other areas such as deductions etc... a running total.
What's great about it: Easy to use, great drill down for forms
What's not so great: OFTEN like every year there are pieces that need fixing in returns
Pros: My job status changed this year (switched jobs, lost a job, got a raise or promotion), I bought or sold investments
Overall, it is a great program and just gets better every year. It guides you when you want and lets you loose when when you think you know what you are doing. Then at the end it checks everything.
What's great about it: Simple to follow and complete. handles just about everything that can happen and makes you feel like you can do it right
What's not so great: At the end it asked me for some additional information that I didn't understand where it came from.