TaxOR

Thanks, Mike. I appreciate your generosity here with your time, effort, etc. It's really helpful.

Thanks, Mike. My questions would be: Is this true even if we got TaxWorks through a reseller (TRX)? Is it true even if we didn't use TaxWorks for 2012? (Most of us didn't, for obvious reasons.) What's included? Federal? State? Business? E-file? Is it their desktop version, or their cloud version?

I'll be buying Drake sometime in the next two weeks. If there's an answer from UltraTax before then, I'm happy to listen! But after everything that happened this past off-season, my tolerance for delays is essentially zero. Simply not worth the hassle. FWIW, I got different info from an UltraTax salesperson I spoke with about converting over from TaxWorks - she said "It’s 50% off the first year, 35% off the second year, and 20% off the 3rd year." Obviously, that's still ferociously expensive, so I'm curious to hear what kind of deal you might be able to work out.

For people doing a limited number of returns, TaxWise will probably do fine. For me, not so much. But I'm going to wait until after tax season to switch. They simply don't have a couple of very basic local/city Oregon forms, and they've said they won't be added this year. There's no import from Excel functionality. The print process is user-unfriendly - why can't I just check boxes for the forms I want to print, like you can in every other tax program I've used? Why is there no basic instructions sheet for filing each federal/state/local return? Why does basic info not proforma from year to year - estimated taxes, bank acct info, etc? Why don't names, addresses, and SSNs flow to various state and local forms? (I end up having to retype these several times on every business return!) Whatever. It'll do for this year. I only paid $650, so I can't be too unhappy. I'm not putting up with this kind of crap (especially missing forms!) next year. Consider this not necessarily a rant against TaxWise (or TaxExact, or whoever), but a rant against my own stubborness/reluctance to just up and pay for a decent, full-featured tax program. I've learned my lesson.

I suppose I need to go somewhere else to start griping about TaxWise, huh? It's of course much better than TaxExact, but seriously, I'm finding it pretty deficient, especially in the local/city forms department. I'm buying Drake at the end of tax season. I've had it. I've wasted WAY too much time on crappy software this year.

Glad everyone's having success! It's been an incredible hassle, so it's nice to see that things are finally settling down. Just wanted to post here that the info I got from my reseller (SureFire) is that they purchase the TaxWise license at ~$500, so MainStreet must be taking a loss this year by offering it at $350 in the interest of locking in customers long term (with a $700 renewal price). If anybody can't get in to MainStreet at this point (they haven't returned my calls), I've found the SureFire people to be very pleasant to deal with, and their renewal price is below MainStreet's. If you do go with SureFire, please send me a message beforehand, so I can give you the extension of the person I spoke with there.

Mike - I'm not trying to scare people away! It's a great deal, go for it. But both of the other TaxWise resellers I contacted told me the same thing about the EFIN.

It's not a question of "catching". If the EFIN is in the system, you'll be blocked, and they'll have to release it. My recommendation is simply: ask MainStreet to do a test transmission under your EFIN and see if it goes through. If it does, you're in the clear. If not, you may have a problem. I can't speculate on why my EFIN was still in CCH's system, if others haven't had the same problem. I'm just trying to help people avoid yet another hassle this tax season!

The issue is if CCH has your EFIN in their system as a prior customer. I had purchased ATX directly from CCH in 2009, so my EFIN was in their system. It was a pain the neck trying to get a release. It was successful in the end, though. I'm not that impressed with the TaxWise software, so I'm not sure it was worth the hassle, since I'm going to have to switch out to something more full-featured after this tax season. (Drake or ProSeries.) TaxWise is NOT as good as the TaxWorks software we had last year, and it's certainly not as good as Drake or ProSeries. But at $350, it's a good deal if you think you can use it in the long run. I can't. (Seriously, no schedule D import from Excel? Missing local forms, abysmal client instruction letters, etc. But yes, it's usable, and I e-filed my first return with it yesterday.) Another thing to note: I read on another forum that TaxWise was going to have a major revamp sometime later this year. It it doesn't go well, it might suffer the same problems as what we're seeing from ATX and TaxWorks this year.

Just to add a bit to that - the reseller has to request a "release" from CCH, which in my case was denied, since I used ATX in 2009 under the same EFIN. (It was a big pain in the neck to get them to release me! And in the long run, I don't think it was worth the hassle, since TaxWise really isn't that fantastic. If I could go back and do it again, I'd just go with TaxAct.) So don't purchase TaxWise from a reseller until you're SURE you can efile through them. Over the phone, the reseller should be able to do a test transmission under your EFIN and let you know if CCH is blocking it.

Call your credit card company, and see what they can do for you. That's how I did it.

Just beware that if you've been a CCH customer before (ATX, TaxWise), you may not be able to purchase TaxWise through a reseller. You may get blocked from efiling, if you're using the same EFIN as when you were a CCH customer.

Yes, and the charge was reversed. However, it's not necessarily straightforward to dispute a charge from 10 months ago!

You'll pay through the nose for Drake if you buy it this time of year. Depending on how many returns you do, take a look at TaxAct (Preparer version). ProSeries also has some inexpensive options if you don't do too many returns. Both strike me a very reliable.

Interesting survey, although you gotta take it with a grain (or two) of salt. Really, in my opinion there are 3 levels of software out there. The top notch - Lacerte, UltraxTax, ProSystem The middle ground - ATX, TaxWise, ProSeries, TaxWorks, Drake The unknowns... TaxAct? TaxSlayer? OLTPro? TaxExact? There's no sense comparing group 1 to any other group; they blow them out of the water in terms of both price and functionality. The tricky part is comparing within Group 2 and Group 3. And that's what most of us are trying to do. And if anyone is interested in TaxWise @ 1/3 the retail price, send me a message. No guarantees, but I can point you in the right direction...