tax act vs turbo tax

[philupthegastank]

anyone have a preference and why?

i have very basic taxes to file: married, w2s, house, 401k, only extra income is from gift certificates i got from my work for $50 bucks.

 

[BrotherBart]

I have never used Turbo Tax but have used Tax Act for Fed and stare for years. It doesn't get any easier. Yours sound's like a pencil and paper would work just as well if you can whittle your AGI down below $60K.

 

[CrufflerJJ]

I've used TurboTax for at least the past 15 years. That being said, it's been a royal pain in the tush to install the past 2 years. Cryptic error messages, failed installs, requiring help from Intuit to get it installed. Last year, even after an hour on the phone with a Philippine-based tech support engineer, I never got it installed on my WinXP desktop box & had to use a laptop. This year, even with a totally new computer running Win7, it gave me hassles.

Look on Amazon at the reviews for this year's TurboTax Deluxe. The software maker made a corporate decision to screw their customers by charging extra for features included in all past years of TurboTax.

H&R Block has gotten a lot of new customers this year for their tax prep software, given Intuit's customer service failure. Not sure whether I'll use TurboTax or H&R Block to do this year's taxes.

 

[Charlotte987]

Little bit of a heads up on the turbo tax thing: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/tur...n-u-s-couldn-t-happen-here-cra-says-1.2948402 Don't know if that would make any difference to you, as the article indicates that the tax files that were hacked had very simple passwords like 1234 The thing about turbo tax is that its free, and you could always just use the program and print it out and send it by mail.

You could easily do it yourself, but it you don't want the hassle, there's lots of one time (yearly) software available, H&R Block's program is okay, although they have a tendency to miss some of the deductions you might be able to claim, so you have to be familiar with the deductions that are available to you. But if your taxes are straight-up here's a link to some reviews: (broken link removed)

 

[Wisneaky]

some states I heard are not accepting returns from turbo tax this year because of the fraud. I have used them all in the past. They all work about the same. The last few years I have been using hrblock, but decided to go back to taxact because hrblock charges a lot for fees.

 

[mustash29]

My GF's mom did accounting for 33 years. She was basically a CPA without an official degree. She turned me on to Tax Act. The GF & I have been using it for the last 11 years, it has been working great for us. For basice stuff (single, homeowner, W2, interest income, 401K) it works well.

Simple online program, nothing to install in the pc, etc. Federal is totally free and it's < 20 bucks to complete and e-file state. At the end you can save your returns to your hard drive as a pdf, print a hard copy & e-file. I never worrry about the online cloud type of storage. Next year you log back in and it imports pretty much everything to the forms so all you have to do is review everything and enter your new $ values for each field. Kick ass.

 

[Fsappo]

Only ever used Turbo tax and never once disappointed.

 

[peakbagger]

I have used turbo tax for several years as I get it free from my investment house.

 

[Light in the Dark]

Turbo Tax is a great service. I've used it the past 4 years? Very simple and straight forward.

 

[Retired Guy]

Have used Turbo Tax since they came on 5.5 inch floppy discs. Have never been disappointed.

 

[RSNovi]

I have been using HR Block online which used to be TaxCut for a number of years now. I have had quite good luck with it.

 

[Husky]

I've used TurboTax for at least the past 15 years. That being said, it's been a royal pain in the tush to install the past 2 years. Cryptic error messages, failed installs, requiring help from Intuit to get it installed. Last year, even after an hour on the phone with a Philippine-based tech support engineer, I never got it installed on my WinXP desktop box & had to use a laptop. This year, even with a totally new computer running Win7, it gave me hassles.

Look on Amazon at the reviews for this year's TurboTax Deluxe. The software maker made a corporate decision to screw their customers by charging extra for features included in all past years of TurboTax.

H&R Block has gotten a lot of new customers this year for their tax prep software, given Intuit's customer service failure. Not sure whether I'll use TurboTax or H&R Block to do this year's taxes.

Why install TurboTax. I've been using it for several years and go right of their website. Create an account and your good to go. Can't get any easier.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

Turbo Tax seems to be the way to go. Looks like it's so good that anyone can file your taxes for you!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...rt-fbi-to-investigate-fraudulent-tax-filings/

 

[BrotherBart]

 

[philupthegastank]

thanks for the replies, went with turbotax, but now with all these articles coming up about the FBI probe, i feel like i should have gone with tax act just as a precaution

 

[Light in the Dark]

You will be fine. Dont forget to expense out the cost of Turbo Tax on next years returns (and whatever tax prep service you used last year, deduct this year!)