Another Turbotax Story

[Snaggletooth]

These are probably so common to most of you that it is hardly news anymore. I'll share it anyway.

Tennessee taxpayer owned farmland in Missouri and rented it out. She received 1/3 of the soybean and wheat proceeds, with the operator getting the remainder and paying all operating expenses. Taxpayer paid for fertilizer, property taxes, and very little of anything else. Classic Form 4835 stuff feeding Schedule E, right? Net income $11,000.

Yep, you guessed it. Taxpayer filed Schedule F, and thus subjected herself to $1700 in self-employment tax. Found a couple other oversights, total refund $2200+.

Going behind Turbo-Tax? My last 6 such encounters produced 1 return with no change, and this one was prepared by a CPA who had a K-1 from an estate and unsure of herself. The other 5 have all produced amended returns, the smallest refund about $800.

No mistake by Turbo-Tax, its calculations impeccably accurate. But this is the outfit (Intuit) that is going to make ordinary laymen into CPAs? Ridiculous as all of you know, they are selling the public on this, and this perception is taking business away from us, deserved or not.

But I have quite a backlog of clients now who will NEVER use TurboTax again.

[S T]

How

Snags,

How or why are you obtaining these clients after 4/15 tax filing? Or are these clients that filed Turbo Tax in 2006 and you are preparing their return for 2007 and offering to recheck their prior year return?

You need to share with us! Maybe we can all place an ad in the paper or something to recheck self prepared returns. Altho I am sure that some clients would not like us scruntinizing their self prepared return to closely.

Sandy

[Snaggletooth]

Misleading

My last six described "go behind TurboTax" encounters have taken place over the last two years. 4 this year 2 last year. Sorry if the post was misleading.

I encountered one of them last night for a new customer who filed an extension on TT. My normal procedure for a new customer is to dig through the prior year (2006) return. I uncovered the farm mistake on the 2006 return, and had the customer filed 2007, she would have made the same mistake. Now she is trying to find her 2005 return.

There is a wealth of recovery to be had if we could just get these clients to examine their returns. There won't be much recovery on short forms or clients who simply have W-2s and Schedule As. But tons of money can be found if the client has Schdule C, E, F, D, etc.

Last night's new customer paid $79 for her version of TurboTax. In 2007, she sold two parcels of inherited land, had the aforementioned farm rental, a pre-school daycare business in her home, a husband who earned over $150,000, plus a 1099-MISC for serving as an expert witness in court, a daughter with a 1099-T, and a 1099-T for back-to-school hubby, plus $26K in itemized deductions. Absolutely no way this taxpayer should be attempting to do their own taxes on TurboTax.