HOH Nightmare!!

[MAJ]

Here's a good one..

New client.
Boyfriend lives with her {38 years together). He doesn't work.
She has been claiming HOH for "Years" with him as the reason.

I'm like - Uh, No! You can't do that!
Without the HOH she's getting $1,000 and change as a refund.
If she could claim the HOH she'll get $4,000 as a refund.

She said her old preparer did it the last few years. Before that another one did as well.

I told her my sofftware won't even entertain the idea.

She can:
1) Take the return back to the old preparer and I will not feel the least bit offended.
2) Prepare the return on her own and try her luck.

But I really can't file the return in that manner.

Ever come across something like this??

[Koss]

HOH Qualifications

I agree that her boyfriend is not a qualifying person for purposes of HOH.

I talked to someone last week who had seen another tax pro within my office, and had walked out without completing the return because they weren't satisfied. Her sister had then proceeded to prepare the return online, using a consumer version of Taxslayer, and had come up with a much better refund. They wanted to know why.

This non-client had gotten to the point where the online program was asking for a credit card payment, and had stopped there. So she was unable to print the return. But she actually gave me her username and password, and allowed me to log in to the return on the Taxslayer website, which was in a "saved" status.

I only spent a few minutes looking at it, because I couldn't view the complete return, either, since she hadn't paid their fee. But I figured out pretty fast that she had somehow gotten the program to accept HOH filing status without a qualifying person.

I explained this, and I told her that I would be suprised if the return even passed the error check stage or made it through electronic filing.

I invited her back to the office, of course. We'll see if she ever turns up.

BMK

[joanmcq]

There was a time in years past where a non-relative could qualify you for HOH, but I can't remember when. The person had to live with you all year & qualify as dependent. The change occurred before I got a student live in boyfriend that could have qualified me for HOH sometime in the past. So 'rules changed' could be an answer to that & 'apparently your prior preparer didn't know that'.

[DaveO]

A couple of years ago the older brother of one of my clients came in. I prepared his return as single, no dependents. While he and his sister lived in the same house he did not support her. He claimed an on-line site gave him a better refund so he did it there. I told him he must be using the wrong filing status but he swore he wasn't. Of course when I filed sisters return it kicked out that someone had already claimed her as a dependent. Little sister was not happy!

[geekgirldany]

I had something similar happen. Daughter, mother, and daughter's child living in same home. Granny's home. Both worked but granny was claming son for hoh... daughter claimed son as dependent. Daughter is a customer and I told her the rules were changed. Granny ask her preparer. He said I was wrong. Printed out the new rules to give preparer via daughter.... he said I was right and changed the granny's return.