Depreciation Issues???

[Patrick Michael]

There was a thread in another tax blog discussing tax software and several posts said there were problems with Drake's depreciation calculations.  They did not elaborate on what the problems were.  They did say Drake was aware of the issue and chose not to address it and they had to manually override the entry.  I was looking into switching from ATX to Drake for 2015 and was wondering if anyone has experienced problems with depreciation and if so, what is the issue?

 

Thanks.

[Catherine]

I have had NO problems with Drake depreciation -- but neither do I have clients with dozens upon dozens of assets (any more).  The one issue I had was how to properly account for an item abandoned mid-year.  One three-minute call to Drake resolved how to properly enter it.

[jklcpa]

I haven't had any issues either, and I run another depreciation program for more detailed analysis of fixed assets for my business clients that require financial statements.  The calculations have been accurate with both programs arriving at the same figures.

One thing that Drake's depreciation does not do is that it doesn't automatically carry amounts to the Form 4684 for casualty and theft dispositions. I think it tries to put it on the 4797, so the user must make those entries manually on the 4684. I haven't had one of these to enter yet, so I'm not sure of how the entries would be made.

One of my clients had damage and theft of copper wiring, etc from outside a/c units, but the entire replacement wasn't completed until 2015, so I attached the statement to defer that since the gain/loss wasn't determinable as of the filing date. I'll have to deal with that next tax season.

[jklcpa]

There was a thread in another tax blog discussing tax software and several posts said there were problems with Drake's depreciation calculations.  They did not elaborate on what the problems were.  They did say Drake was aware of the issue and chose not to address it and they had to manually override the entry.  I was looking into switching from ATX to Drake for 2015 and was wondering if anyone has experienced problems with depreciation and if so, what is the issue?

 

Thanks.

Could you provide a link to the discussion so that we could see it?

It looks like you've posted over on the Drake forum also and have received some answers to what some others have had issues with. If you search that software subforum for "depreciation" you should get lots of hits with people asking questions.  It seems that many of the posts are people asking about how to make specific entries or set up an asset properly, not that the program is flawed.
 

Edited June 26, 2015 by jklcpa

[Patrick Michael]

Here's the link.  It is in the Tax Business Owners group in LinkedIn.

https://www.linkedin.com/grp/post/1868452-6017063664580845569

Thanks for the responses.

 

[Cathy]

Patrick, 

Thanks for your post.  I will now look further into the issue before I sign up with them.  I've been with ATX for years but this past filing season I had a couple of issues with the software that ATX chose to ignore.  I found a work-around on one and sent in a paper return on the other and IRS agreed with my interpretation of a health insurance credit which could have cost my client $5,000 had I let the "team" tell me my client wasn't eligible for the credit.

Many years ago, I had signed up with Drake first during the year I signed up with ATX.  The reason I sent the software back to Drake was over depreciation issues back then.  They gave me a full refund.  Your post rang a bell that I didn't want to hear.  Hopefully, Drake will be o'kay as I refuse to use ATX another year.  But, I will look further if they still have depreciation problems....or if depreciation problems have once again raised it's ugly head!  

Thanks!

Cathy