Wednesday, February 25, 2015

It should have been easy(ier)

My big goal for my Get 'Er Done day was to finish my taxes.  And I was well on my way....

I use Turbo Tax each year.  I have tried other programs, and for me, they aren't as user friendly and I have found that their numbers don't match the ones I get with Turbo Tax.  So...Turbo Tax it is.  This year I decided to do it through the on-line program, instead of a CD or Download.  It is all the same program.  So that is where we are...

Turbo tax starts with your federal taxes.  The only "new" thing for us this year was that G-man worked ONE STINKING MONTH in NC instead of CT.  But his W-2 had the breakdown, so no biggie in entering it.  I bobbed along, putting in my stuff.  I used their "It's Deductible" program to figure out the value of the stuff we donated as we were cleaning out the house in preparation for moving.  (And have grossly underestimated the value of my bags of stuff in the past!). 

I realized that I needed to call camp to get their tax ID (used a different camp this past year).  That is the only "problem" with our federal.  Once they call me back (and they are slow about this), the federal is DONE.  We ended up with a WAY larger refund that we were expecting.  We think it is because of the adjustments from G-man's second job that we never re-adjusted after he quit.

So on to State.  Turbo Tax let us know that we have to file "Married Separate" for our State taxes due to the ONE STINKING MONTH G-man was in NC.  OK fine, whatever.  BUT.....

Turbo Tax can't handle us filing "Married Jointly" for Federal, and "Married Separate" for State.  It just doesn't allow you to have different filing statuses.  You have to go back to the "personal info" tab and change the status, but that changes your Federal Return as well.

SO...after about 45 minutes of searching for an answer on how to use Turbo Tax AND fix the problem....the only solution I found was to create 2 new accounts for Turbo Tax...one for me and one for G-man.  Then I would create a dummy Federal return as Married Separate for each of us, and then the State portion of the program will be happy.  Then I will have to figure out which deduction will belong to each one of us.  Turbo Tax had us getting a State refund (which rarely happens!!) as Married Joint...so I would like to keep it that way once we are Married Separate.

(As a side note...we will also have to file a NC return....but we are at net zero for that.  No money issue, just need to fill out the form).

The idea of having to do this was not appealing.  So I called a big-name tax prep service and asked how much it would be just to have the State Taxes done.  It would be $90 PER RETURN, plus an additional fee for each form past the standard form.  Oh hella no.

So I am back to having to create separate accounts.  I am running out of available time at this point in the day, so that is where I stopped.  This weekend I will now re-do our federal stuff (even though these returns will not be submitted, but will allow the State portion of the program to pull the numbers in).  And hopefully by Monday the taxes will ACTUALLY be done.

Anyone know of an easier way????


15 comments:

  1. as I am in Canada, I can't really help. However we do use Turbo Tax ourselves here.

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  2. Last year was the first year I did not pay someone else to do our taxes. We used turbo tax which was so easy. Will use it again this year.

    In Canada, we only do federal taxes thankfully.

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    1. CT Taxes are horrid. Hopefully NC will be better.

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  3. Wow that sucks. I have had to file multiple state forms before but I was always single so I never ran into your problem. Have you tried talking to a turbo tax online support person? Sometimes they can give more insight then just searching through the Q&A section.

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    1. I tried to call....I couldn't get a person on the line. Will have to try again.

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  4. We used Turbo Tax for our federal return but for the state, I just went and downloaded the form from the state website. It was super easy to fillnout and definitely took less than 30 minutes. I know every state is different but most just have you fill in stuff from your federal return so you might check it out.

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    1. I will have to mail in the state return...but I need the program to do all the calculations for me. I have to keep playing around with the combinations ....who claims house, kids, etc. The form is straightforward. ..but it is the recalculating each time I change something.

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  5. Have you tried Tax Act online? I doubt I have as much of a complicated return but it might not be bad to try it out.

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  6. That sounds like a bunch of muck. I always thought filing in two different states would be a big pain, and I was right.

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  7. This sounds more complicated than my self-employed situation... so I hire an accountant. It costs me a painful amount but I figure that stressing over numbers and tax laws would drive me cray!

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  8. I feel your pain. Last year I finally caved and paid someone to do out taxes because it was getting way more complicated than I could deal with. Wishing you luck.

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  9. Here's how you can file your state taxes for free - http://www.ct.gov/drs/cwp/view.asp?a=1433&q=265866

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  10. Also, are you sure you have to file state as single? We did not have to do that when my husband worked in 2 states one year. - btw, same situation as you are in now, took us 6 months to sell and move.

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    1. We aren't filing single...it is married, separate. Because he was not a resident here on Dec 31...he is considered a separate return.

      We will file them without turbo tax...I just need it to help me figure out the numbers

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