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FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

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Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#181

Post by int_19h »

cookiecaper wrote: post #177
analog31 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do anyway. One year, I must have screwed up my return, because I got a letter from the IRS saying: We think you screwed up, here's why, send us X amount, and we're good. Or you can file an amended return. I sent in X amount. We were good.

FYI those letters are, afaik at least, typically grossly overestimated. The number is meant to scare you into calling a CPA to straighten it out, essentially. So for anyone else with the same kind of letter, don't just pay unless you know that it's correct ahead of time.

Note that this is a letter for an incorrect return, not an unfiled one.

I had one of those, and it specifically identified the error. When I went and checked the paperwork, the figure in the letter was precisely correct.

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#183

Post by overcast »

loosescrews wrote: post #137
klmadfejno wrote: post #50

God I hope this suit is successful. Lots of people here are discussing the regulatory trap they've got, and that's a big problem. But the actual problem mentioned in the suit is deceptive marketing. TurboTax is the worst in this regard. Last year, I, at every step of the process, declined the expensive options that say "maybe you'll save more money if you permanently switch into this paid mode". Yet after a couple ho…

I have tried nearly all of the DIY tax offerings out there. CreditKarma has a relatively new completely free offering that I feel rivals TurboTax in ease of use. I also feel that it is superior to paid offerings such as H&R Block. Another completely free offering is freetax.com. I used them for a few years, and while not quite as easy to use, it works well. Note that both of these free offerings include free state ta…

Yeh I found CreditKarma last tax season, and it worked a treat. Of course shortly after that, Intuit bought them as well. Sigh.

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#184

Post by commoner »

chungalunga wrote: post #48
ourmandave wrote: post #47

Ironically, for most people the IRS has a copy of most your forms (W2, 1099s, etc.) already and can do your taxes for you if you want.

Yep, they’ll eventually send you a bill if you owe. For some strange reason they won’t send you a refund if you’re eligible.

Sometimes, the IRS identifies the overpayment and sends the taxpayer a CP268 notice. The taxpayer can choose to receive a check or a credit against other taxes.

https://www.irs.gov/individuals/understanding-your-cp268-not...

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#185

Post by Karuhanga »

supernova87a wrote: post #72

Why are we bothering with the small potatoes in the room (TurboTax not putting URLs to free tax filing, etc. etc) when the elephant is: "Why isn't the IRS giving people a way to prepopulate and file taxes for free with the financial info that the IRS already has on everyone?" Well, I suppose it's just a product of the corporate interests and congressional deadlock that prevents us from doing a multitude of things rig…

https://youtu.be/Nn_Zln_4pA8 John Oliver dives into why.

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#186

Post by beefield »

int_19h wrote: post #181
cookiecaper wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI those letters are, afaik at least, typically grossly overestimated. The number is meant to scare you into calling a CPA to straighten it out, essentially. So for anyone else with the same kind of letter, don't just pay unless you know that it's correct ahead of time.

Note that this is a letter for an incorrect return, not an unfiled one. I had one of those, and it specifically identified the error. When I went and checked the paperwork, the figure in the letter was precisely correct.

So, a tax filing life hack: fill $1 to all fields of the form and wait IRS to tell how much you actually need to pay?

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#187

Post by comex »

crispyporkbites wrote: post #149
scott_s wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because we know the answer: the IRS is prevented from doing that by law. Lobbied by Intuit. If you google around, you can find stories on it. edit: save_ferris linked to an excellent story below: https://www.propublica.org/article/filing-taxes-could-be-fre...

Ok so I don’t know much about the us legal and political system, but a couple of questions: - why does a judge in a lawsuit get to make the decision here? I.e. why is this kind of law not debated as part of public discourse and a decision made through a democratic path? - given this benefits a tiny fraction of people in the US, why doesn’t a particular party/politician take a stand on it as a policy to win a chunk of…

> - why does a judge in a lawsuit get to make the decision here? I.e. why is this kind of law not debated as part of public discourse and a decision made through a democratic path?

What judge?

The FTC investigation mentioned in the article may end with the FTC filing a lawsuit, but that would be about whether Intuit deceived taxpayers (by directing them towards a paid version even if they were eligible to file for free), not whether the Free File program should exist or whether the IRS should develop its own software.

The Free File program as it currently exists is the result of executive action, a “memorandum of understanding” between the IRS and tax software companies. [1] Last year there was a bill in Congress that would have codified it into law, but that part of the bill was dropped due to concerns it would permanently bar the IRS from developing its own software. ProPublica’s reporting about Intuit’s obfuscation played a part in that outcome. So there was a “public discourse” of sorts, although it’s a pretty obscure issue.

Also:

> given this benefits a tiny fraction of people in the US

Keep in mind that a large fraction of Congress follows the ideology that, broadly speaking, the government can’t do anything right and it’s best to outsource as much as possible to private companies. Intuit’s lobbying was obviously a major factor, but they were playing for a receptive audience. Congress is also not particularly tech-savvy, by and large.

[1] https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2019/jun/congress-...

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#189

Post by thayne »

loosescrews wrote: post #137
klmadfejno wrote: post #50

God I hope this suit is successful. Lots of people here are discussing the regulatory trap they've got, and that's a big problem. But the actual problem mentioned in the suit is deceptive marketing. TurboTax is the worst in this regard. Last year, I, at every step of the process, declined the expensive options that say "maybe you'll save more money if you permanently switch into this paid mode". Yet after a couple ho…

I have tried nearly all of the DIY tax offerings out there. CreditKarma has a relatively new completely free offering that I feel rivals TurboTax in ease of use. I also feel that it is superior to paid offerings such as H&R Block. Another completely free offering is freetax.com. I used them for a few years, and while not quite as easy to use, it works well. Note that both of these free offerings include free state ta…

I've tried a few. But got really frustrated when I had to select the paid option to enter my mortgage information, just to be told that the standard deduction was higher than an itemized deduction anyway, but no way to switch back to the free version.

So last year, I just filled out the forms myself. For me at least, it wasn't actually all that much harder. Sure the UI isn't as nice, and the questions are a little bit harder to understand, but when it comes down to it, I need to fill in the same information either way.

Re: FTC Is Investigating Intuit over TurboTax Practices

#190

Post by thayne »

pc86 wrote: post #130
cactus2093 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like TurboTax is probably not worth the hassle of trying to use for free. They try to steer you at every turn into accidentally accepting the paid features, and if you manage to make it through the maze there doesn't really seem to be much left that makes them better than any of the simpler competitors if you stick to the free tiers - no saving your information year over year, no automatically importing the sup…

> And if the answer is that the tax code is way too complicated that it's prohibitively expensive for the government to build a site as comprehensive as Turbotax, then fix it! "Fix it" only makes sense for bugs. It doesn't make sense for features. TurboTax, accounting firms, entire professional organizations (CPAs) live off of the fact that the tax code is hard to understand. Maybe it needs to be difficult to properl…

Likewise lawyers live off of laws being hard to understand, and the legal system being hard to navigate.

Fixing the US health care system would probably also destroy quite a few jobs in health insurance and medical billing.

It turns out overcomplicated and wasteful systems also make jobs. So even if fixing the system would be better for society in the long run, all the lobbyists have to say is "doing that will destroy X jobs" and the politicians will be scared into inaction.

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