Tax Time CountdownFollow

We're* in the final 48 hours before your taxes need to be in the loving embrace of the IRS, or at least postmarked as such. I filed my own this year since, looking at our 1040, I couldn't justify paying the accountant to do it. I went with H&R Block's software (after discounts: $10) and was pretty happy with it except that they give you free federal filing and then try to milk you for $20 to e-file your state taxes. Nuts to that, I just stuffed them in an envelope and sent them off. Illinois does have free e-filing through the state .gov site but I didn't feel like starting all over with the data entry either and I'm not in much of a hurry to get my refund.

My net refund is $42 so I guess I planned out my deductions just right.

Anyone have any stumbles or stories with the ACA requirement? I thought I'd have to submit some sort of evidence but it was all "Oh, insurance through an employer? Works for us" and that was that. A friend of Flea's got dinged with the false return scam where she went to file the other day and was told "We already have your return on file". Someone had submitted a fraudulent return and nicked the refund. Nothing like that here though -- the IRS was more than happy to take my stuff.


*Only Americans count

I did mine a few weeks ago. I used the free version of Turbotax. They do the same thing with the trying to charge for the state return. I just did it on the state site for free. All told, it took about an hour. I got back a whopping $21.00, so I suppose I did the right thing in going for the free filing options.

No real reason to file early if you owe.

I'd be hard pressed to find a realistic situation where you would benefit from paying someone months before you had to.

You have the money now, but not sure if you would have the money later.

I used TaxAct, it worked out fine. I think TurboTax might be a bit easier but they raised their price. I have to itemize deductions, and I paid for the state filing, and the total for doing both and efiling both was $25.00. I think I read, somewhere along the way as I went through screen after screen, that New York requires efiling now, but I could be wrong because I didn't read it closely since I want to efile anyway.

Also, IRS seems to be trying to crack down a bit on the scams, I had to provide either my adjusted gross income from last year or my efiling PIN from last year before I could efile this year.

It seems like you are required to efile in NY in some cases. I'm not the kind of guy who uses tax software, because by the 4th banal "did you use any elephants to fly into space this year" wizard question, I've destroyed all of my records. Also, really not that challenging to read directions and fill out a form.

http://www.tax.ny.gov/pit/efile/efile_mandate_for_individuals.htm

It seems sort of unenforceable (or maybe just not worth enforcing) to prove that I used tax software and have broadband if/when I print my forms and mail them in.

Totally unenforceable. I haven't looked, but I'd be *astonished* if the statue (assuming one even exists) has any sort of penalty.

The two are not mutually exclusive

I'm going to get a pretty decent refund from Uncle Sam (more than $100 but less than $1000), which leads me to believe that either I made an error on my return and I'm going to get slammed for it, or my company's Payroll department is full of hollering idiots (probably the latter - people who work in Payroll are one step up from the rest of the cretins in HR).

My state taxes, on the other hand, were bang-on (within $1) since I refuse to claim any "use tax" for items bought online. Until they figure out how to tax it at the time of purchase, I'm not giving them any help.

Same here. Paid some debt and vacation trips.

Wait. Is that what that's about? I read the description, got as far as "if you blah blah blah", and skipped it. Eh.

I was surprised how close I was on both this year. Just getting a few hundred from state and federal. Not bad at all.

That's a good point. I suppose it wasn't an interest free loan when I stole it.