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TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

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Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#241

Post by danso »

mlindner wrote: post #194

The IRS already provides a free-file option, you just need to spend more time reading instructions. https://www.irs.gov/e-file-providers/before-starting-free-fi... Not sure what all the hate is here. If you're not completely uneducated, you can figure this out yourself.

If you're going to tell us to "spend more time reading instructions", maybe you should take the time to read and follow the links you send. What the site your link refers to -- freefilefillableforms.com -- is not a service built by the IRS.

Did you really believe the U.S. Congress, and Turbotax's lobbyists, would be proposing and debating a bill on the existence of something you think you found with a Google search?

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#243

Post by Terr_ »

linsomniac wrote: post #121
linsomniac wrote: post #37

Govt: "We need some money from you to buy things." Me: "How much?" Govt: "You figure it out." Me: "Oh, I get to pay whatever I want?" Govt: "LOL, no, we have a figure that we want you to pay." Me: "What happens if I guess that number wrong?" Govt: "You get to go to prison."

Ok folks, I get it. :-) This was a caricature of the process, and as such there are some inaccuracies. But the core of it that "makes you think", has some ounce of truth to it. I'll agree, my interactions with the IRS have gone extremely smoothly when there have been problems.

> But the core of it that "makes you think"

Unfortunately the same can be said of all sort sorts of fake news stuff: "OK, so it's false, but the idea is important or it happened somewhere else..."

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#244

Post by perl4ever »

Gene_Parmesan wrote: post #240
kristopolous wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many are convinced that paying the workers, the lobbyists, shareholders, board of directors, and contract overhead is cheaper than just paying the workers directly. I've been investigating why people think this for years. I've read a number of books, listened to lectures, went to proseminars in economics at UC schools, took some classes ... Recently, I've become increasingly convinced it's actually just a giant hustl…

> Just like 500 years ago how religious people controlled the narrative and set up the rules of society and "laws of nature" to basically be giant money trees for them, there's a new class of people who have done the same thing. It's still religion, in terms of the psychology behind it. It's just a religion devoted to money. Every middle-income person has been fooled into thinking that they're a CEO for a company of…

"People have been trained to see the government as a black hole of money wasting."

The state and federal governments are large enough that pretty much everybody has either worked for them or knows people that have. So it's not really helpful to tell people they are brainwashed and don't know anything about reality. Sure, lots of people are stupid or misinformed, but that doesn't mean they have no experience with what they dislike.

I have worked for a Fortune 500 company, a non-profit subsidiary of a state university, a federal contractor, and a state government (but not in a civil service protected position). Have you experienced first hand the different types of organizations in forming your opinions?

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#245

Post by perl4ever »

nickjj wrote: post #150
RubberSoul wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the IRS will pay you interest under certain circumstances. Two examples are when they are late processing a refund or when a prior return is amended. I got a 1099-INT from the IRS in 2018. The interest rate is not 5%, however. Also, 5% is not currently the risk free rate of return. Also, it sounds like you're referring to the penalty for underpayment, which I believe is currently 3.6% of the total underpayment f…

What circumstances will they pay you interest? That has never happened to me. Because this year I got hit by some underpayment penalties (with interest added on top) but at the same time I also got a refund which had no interest applied to it. That is being self employed and paying estimated taxes every quarter.

Once I was getting a background check in which I had to certify all my debts to the government were paid.

I realized that several years back, I had worked at a temp job for a very brief time and I probably never got a W-2 and therefore never paid taxes on it. Thus, I called up the IRS, got the W-2 information which they had, and duly filed an amended return with a check for something like $20.

However, in a rather short amount of time, I got a letter from the IRS stating that they could not accept a payment for a return more than a couple years old and here was a check for the amount, plus interest.

So I can tell you they not only pay interest on your money, but they pay it on money they are returning even though you actually owed it.

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#247

Post by kalleboo »

jimrhods23 wrote: post #192
metalliqaz wrote: post #4

Yeah they do, of course they do. They are in business to make money, after all. The real story is the absolute travesty of government corruption that TurboTax and HR Block have perpetrated by making it illegal for the government to make tax filing as easy as it should be. It's one of the things I would immediately correct if I was king for a day.

If the government made it easy, the default tax form would give no benefit to the taxpayer. Many uneducated people would just hand it in and not have any write offs/deductions anyway. By making it require a small amount of effort, people are forced to take a look at what they are paying. People with money/educated about taxes would actually take the time to fill out the forms and benefit from deductions. It wouldn't…

Part of the problem is of course the convoluted tax code in the US with all the very specific deductions and odd cases, where other countries may have much more simplified tax codes to avoid the problem completely.

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#248

Post by dang »

nabakin wrote: post #217
alanh wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

did you really just paste a viral tweet here without attribution? :/

It doesn't add anything to the discussion either. Might be against HN's rules. Edit: not in line with the guidelines at least First paragraph > Be kind. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, > Eschew flamebait. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html I'd flag, but I don't see the option.

Flagging requires karma > 30. Then you can click on a comment's timestamp to go to its page, where you'll find a 'flag' link.

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#249

Post by colejohnson66 »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #237
mortgagemonster wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Credit Karma does legitimately free filing

I prepared my taxes with Credit Karma, then with Turbo Tax, and CK was showing me a significantly higher return that TT. Upon investigating, I found that I had accidentally claimed my mortgage interested deduction twice, and didn't enter my 1099-G from my state tax refund from the previous year. CK makes it too easy to make a mistake. TT is a much more polished product, which makes sense since they've been doing it f…

Credit Karma just added free audit defense to their tax prep

Re: TurboTax Hides Its Free File Page from Search Engines

#250

Post by colejohnson66 »

rdiddly wrote: post #94

Who wants to just start writing a free version and start putting them out of business? Filing taxes is not the Linux kernel, I mean how complicated is it really? It's still just a matter of following directions and doing basic math. Computers are great at that. No rocket science needed. I even thought of a name: Caesar (as in "render unto..."). Caesar.org is available. At the end it generates a PDF for printing & mai…

> Who wants to just start writing a free version and start putting them out of business?

CreditKarma is trying it seems

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