TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019) • Hacker News Board

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#121

Post by bluedino » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:40 PM UTC

mandelbrotwurst wrote: post #40

daveslash wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was confused by this too.... I've never filed my own taxes; I've always paid a tax preparer. I've always thought that I could file them myself for free if I wanted to, but just felt more comfortable paying someone who does it professionally and knows more ins-and-outs of tax law. Is that not true - can I not file myself for free if I make more than $66k/yr? I looked here [1], and it looks like I can? It's still not…

You definitely can, you'll just have to fill out a bunch of complicated forms (accessible via the "Use Free File Fillable Forms" button on the page you linked), which is what you pay your accountant to do, and that anyone has the option to purchase TurboTax software to assist with. The article leaves this out. Yes, it would be great if the IRS were able to provide software as slick as Intuit's to assist with this, an…

I’d love to see the government created tax filing website, that would be similar to TurboTax, crash when say, 25 people logged into it.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#122

Post by timr » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:40 PM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #49

klmadfejno wrote: post #21

I used to say turbo tax wasn't that bad, and that free filing was easy if you just ignored their promises to save you money if you upgraded. Last year however I got all the way to the end of the process where they revealed I made too much and had to pay. That felt extremely unethical, as the information required to come to that conclusion was available far earlier in the process. And yet what am I going to do but use…

Credit Karma is free. Works great, and has no discernable dark patterns. They even have import features from major payroll companies like ADP. I had to quit turbotax because one year I was a 1099 worker and every year since, it pushes me to go with their "small business edition." Each year it got harder to avoid "upgrading." Seriously, just do it. Quitting TT is so much easier than quitting anything else.

Having used Credit Karma in the past, you should know that it can be...dangerously confusing...for anything other than the happy path.

Things like backdoor Roth contributions (which aren't that exotic, tbh) were very confusing in credit karma, to the point where I actually did my taxes with another service just to verify that the calculations were correct, then submitted with CK. I found several mistakes in the CK results that were due to bad/confusing UI.

You likely won't hit this problem if you're just doing a 1040EZ or 1040 with standard deduction, no stock sales, etc. But if you have any complications...sometimes there's a reason to pay for software.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#123

Post by imjared » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:40 PM UTC

Are there other services that allow for such easy import of other account data? I have a handful of investment accounts scattered like Wealthfront and Robinhood and the one-click imports from each service feel really seamless.

I don't like coughing up the few hundred dollars every year but I'm also lucky enough to not have to think about it much other than on whatever weekend afternoon I choose to slog through the endless prompts.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#124

Post by klmadfejno » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:40 PM UTC

swebs wrote: post #67

klmadfejno wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there are any republican commentators willing to defend this policy I'd love to hear their reasoning. This one does seem, almost objectively, evil imo.

Where are you getting this bizarre assumption that the average Republican commentator would side with Intuit here?

Its a predominantly republican politician led position. Likely not mainstream among actual constituents, just corruption among the politicians. But if there are any who can defend the practice, I'm interested to hear.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#125

Post by WarOnPrivacy » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

deeeeplearning wrote: post #23

qnk wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question, how is lobbying different from bribery? Lobbyists go to Washington, spend fortunes on taking lawmakers to fancy dinners and then get away with what they want. Maybe I don't understand the process and am oversimplifying it, but that's how I see it.

> how is lobbying different from bribery? Oh, that's easy. Lobbying is legal, bribery isn't.

You seem to be mistaken. In the US, trading law for campaign cash is very legal.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#126

Post by noodlenotes » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:42 PM UTC

rconti wrote: post #30

Funny anecdote, I've been using TurboTax installable for a decade or so (having given up on doing them completely by hand). Been considering hiring a professional because you always hear that they are worth their weight in gold. (Our tax situation is not particularly complicated though, typical Silicon Valley married homeowners). Well, last year, did everything in turbotax, said we were short by like 15k. Believable,…

BTDT = been there done that

Should I feel old if I didn't know that?

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#127

Post by klmadfejno » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

vmception wrote: post #77

klmadfejno wrote: post #21

I used to say turbo tax wasn't that bad, and that free filing was easy if you just ignored their promises to save you money if you upgraded. Last year however I got all the way to the end of the process where they revealed I made too much and had to pay. That felt extremely unethical, as the information required to come to that conclusion was available far earlier in the process. And yet what am I going to do but use…

> And yet what am I going to do but use turbo tax again. The perceived risk and effort That’s so cute how everyone is afraid of the IRS boogeyman Everyone believes whichever way they first became comfortable with is saving them money and their freedom I know people that would say the exact same thing except they are referring to their table full of printed out forms Literally everyone with a super wrong and very huma…

I was almost a CPA. I passed the exam.

I'm aware that in my current state I just take the standard deduction and call it a day. But the time and chance of having to go back to it due to a mess up is more than $80 imo.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#128

Post by em3rgent0rdr » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #113

asavadatti wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless your taxes are really simple I’d suggest hiring a professional to do it for you. It is money well spent

I would hope anyone who made it through A US K-12 education would be able to do their own taxes if all they have is W-2. Even 1099/student loan interest deductions/etc is pretty easy. I would say it only gets really complicated once you venture into dealing with equity and AMT and stuff. It’s funny though that people will scour the web and clip coupons to save money, but they won’t research how their biggest expense…

Researching how taxes are calculated takes up valuable time and mental capacity, and you have to reeducate yourself every couple years on whatever new tweaks to the tax system happened.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#129

Post by superjan » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

So in the Netherlands, I can file my taxes for free, it takes me less than an hour for me and my wife. It’s also auto populated with all relevant figures. The hardest part is remembering your password for the nationwide single-sign-on service. Some problems are best solved by governments.

Re: TurboTax Tricked You into Paying to File Your Taxes (2019)

#130

Post by toast0 » Thu, Feb 11, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

rconti wrote: post #30

Funny anecdote, I've been using TurboTax installable for a decade or so (having given up on doing them completely by hand). Been considering hiring a professional because you always hear that they are worth their weight in gold. (Our tax situation is not particularly complicated though, typical Silicon Valley married homeowners). Well, last year, did everything in turbotax, said we were short by like 15k. Believable,…

> Been considering hiring a professional because you always hear that they are worth their weight in gold. (Our tax situation is not particularly complicated though, typical Silicon Valley married homeowners).

Tax professionals may be worth their weight in gold if you can rearrange your finances to do things they recommend to reduce your taxes. If you're just a regular person (perhaps highly compensated), there's not that much to do. Especially with the cap on State and Local Tax deduction, there's not much room for a professional to ask about deductable things you might have forgotten, because even if you have them, they will likely not add up to the standard deduction.

Now, if you own a business that makes a lot of profit, a professional should be able to advise you on how to reduce or delay tax on that. There's lots of options there, and they might not be apparent.