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I really miss being able to enter a 2848 right on e-Services and get info immediately. I used it. How could this be a cost saving, when now they have to process faxed 2848s?!

#1 Pensioner - comes in 4 times each season for everything: "Just got this in the mail. What's it all about?" BB: The company's raising your pension 40 cents next year. #2 EIC guy calls - "Where's my refund?" BB: (checking IRS website) It's been applied to a debt - you told me didn't owe anybody. "Well, there was one I didn't mention." #3 Beautician (yak-yak-yak-yak...must be an occupational hazard) "Put my car miles down-everybody says that counts a lot." BB: Okay, how much? "At least 100 miles." #4 "What's the fee?" BB:$125 to $145. "My son paid $75." BB: He's single with one W-2 - you've got 4 W-2s, AOTC, and child care. "We'll have to talk it over." Out the door. #5 "I've got two house mortgages so I guess I can't use both." BB: No, interest on a vacation house is okay. "Actually we rent it out." BB: We don't have any figures on that and will need to put it down. "No, we don't clear anything on it." BB: How so? "They just make the payment."

Good thing I'm still using DOS 3.1

I've seen these generate phantom income on disposition due the ordinary income treatment of part of the gain/loss, especially when people already have cap loss c/o. You can end up with a capital loss on disposition and still have to report ordinary gains on the 4797.

Justifiable homicide. That is (or should be!) the nickname of this "major update" and I thank God that I am still on Win7Pro64-bit.

It was back in February when I had something similar, and if I recall, in the section for the documents you relied upon, I said something smart like, "For the child living with this taxpayer, I have thus and so, and for the other child, the taxpayer has form 8332." It is impossible, and I bet next year we have to complete an 8867 for every child or the form will change.

Good thing I am still on Win 7 Pro.

And the stupid calculations are a PITA and have to be done with pencil and paper, too.

I'd rather deal with the IRS than anyone from NYS tax and finance. Just sayin....

Microsoft is releasing a major update for Win 10 on April 11th. If you don't want to wrestle with all the changes, turn off your automatic update setting until after tax season

I am joining the conversation to avoid your being talking to yourself.

I'd put it on Line 21 with a back-out also on Line 21. Since you've already looked up the regs, have a pdf in the client folder ready for if/when the CP2000 notice comes.

ARRRRRGH! My client that is moving to Georgia just received corrected 1099-INT and 1099-B figures from her brokerage account with different figures for bond prem amortization and sizable bases corrections (reduced) of funds sold for covered lots. She settles on the sale of her house here in DE on 4/17 and will be leaving the state the following day. *@$k^(#!&<% and many other bad words. Next rant, I met with a very nice new referred client yesterday with a return he said was easy. He didn't bring last year's return, wife brought the rest of their package today. No return, said that's all they got from last year's preparer...a respected CPA firm over the state line in PA. She's going to ask former preparer for a copy of LY's return. hahaha! All she had were unpaid vouchers for 2017 estimates and the 2-year comparison. I wonder if they mailed the client copy to the IRS?! This return has everything except the kitchen sink...easy my ass. High income multi-state earnings, investment accounts, NII tax, medicare add-on, employee stock options sold, AMT, 2 home offices in their McMansion and supposedly not using the safe harbor so I don't have a starting point for depreciation. Two kids' dep care and education credit info for oldest child all that will phase out. Problems with one page of the University printouts showing one summary total of payments in 2016 but another with the payments dated 1/717 for the fall 2016 tuition! So glad we had to have that extensive discussion for things that are of no benefit and looked problematic. And of course, part of their reason for leaving former CPA was they charged too much... when their work also included handling a collection issue of PA local earned income tax for several years because former-former CA preparer used in the year of move into PA knew nothing about the PA local taxes so those were never filed and paid. More bad words....and back to work!

"Fast"

You WILL get it, @BHoffman - but put this one on extension and tackle it in May!

California answers the phone when you owe them money and are calling to pay them. Otherwise, nada. Most worthless bunch of government do-nothings I have ever come across. I would rather sit on hold for 2 hours to talk to an IRS incompetent than even dial area code 916 to try to get to someone without a superiority complex and a condescending attitude at the FTB. Tom Newark, CA

When the MLP's uniformly generate losses, do not produce cash distributions, and don't pan out for the cash-flow-poor older client, it's not a good investment - at least for them. The only client I have who does well with these things already has bucket-loads of money.

Save me from these long and exasperating telephone calls with older clients that want to chat and can't grasp concept of the simplest of questions. Email with several clients isn't going much better. After a total of 7, yes 7, emails back and forth, I hope this one person knows that I now need the ONE 1099R for her ONE ira distribution. I kid you not! Seven!!!!!!! And then she asked where the distribution was from again! I know she had bad health issues last year...maybe she's on some medications that are affecting her brain! We should probably save my clients from me too. Yesterday was a wrap on another client that was making me crazy with numerous chatty emails back and forth, and then tried to fax me the e-file signature forms and had them in her machine backwards so that I got blank pages... I got the Fed fine and THREE TIMES she sent blank pages for the state form. THREE TIMES! Yes, I'm shouting now. I had to take an allergy pill this morning and that isn't helping either. An intervention may be needed later on today. One guy that I've told repeatedly how many different ways he can get his info to me then thought it would be ok if he just dropped by sometime today when I'm booked full with appts. This was after I told him my availability back two weeks ago and he never bothered to contact me again until yesterday. He's one that thinks he can tell me how this process is going to flow... I have other ideas about that, and no one is going to dictate to me how I choose to run my business. No one. I can't wait for this to be over. /rant

Have to? We do them on a scan of the documents with pasted in calculator tapes from Judy's TenKey. I picked up a pen to use it the other day and the tip had dried out! Have to keep the cap on now.

https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10 So glad I didn't 'upgrade' to 10.

thank you I think I get too picky sometimes.. but then I look back at 2012 and let them claim boyfriend on a family where he went to college and had "no" parents... would not do that anymore - tell them law change - and it did - just not sure when exactly and what - but today I know better

GrandmaBee: That isn't the issue. They are on Income Based repayment plans for their student debt. If they file joint, the student debt repayments triple or quadruple. Much heavier cash cost than the additional tax due to MFS. Rich

I have to try that.

Can you e-file that 2848? I know I can with a return - but have not tried to send one all by its lonesome.

Not for over 2 years now. IRS shut it down because "not enough people were using it to justify the cost."

That is exactly what I was thinking, too. I had never heard of purge fees. We will claim it as alimony. A court had to force him to pay it, but it's alimony all the same. Thanks for the validation.

Disclaimer: I didn't research this and haven't had any clients deal with this on either side, but I'd say that it is alimony that your client received. The purge is imposed because the court felt that this person had the resources to pay his obligation and didn't meet that payment on time, and that failure caused him to be held in contempt. I could be wrong, but I think that the funds your client received was the back alimony that was due her, and it took court action and collection by the court in order for her to get it. Thinking about it from another angle, there is no other type of payment that she would be due, like any sort of punitive damages related to the nonpayment, so I'd say that it is the back alimony that was owed to her. What did you decide?

Does NY ever answer it's phones?! I don't think I've ever spoken to a real person there.

Had a case some years ago needing an ITIN for a dependent who lived in Canada. IRS kept "losing" the documents - or so they claimed. TA office guy said "send them to ME!" and he hand-walked them over and stood over the bozos at the IRS until they issued the ITIN, and then walked back, called me with info, and mailed it all back out himself. I could have kissed him; we battled that for about six months (or more; memory fades) and had submitted identical doc's at least four times.

I had outstanding assistance with TPA. She cut through tons of BS, obstruction and obfuscation (dying to use that word!) for a client who was denied exemption of child despite proper submission of 8332. Guess like the lottery when calling anyone at IRS. Sometimes we get lucky.

The phone call today with my 86 year old deaf client was worthy of an Abbott and Costello skit. "Who's on first?" This so I could answer his question on where his non-working, no income at all, stay-at-home daughter could get tax forms, and after shouting at the top of my lungs that she didn't need to file if she didn't have income. She wants to file, he said, because she has a child and believes she will get a big tax refund. I screamed out the local VITA phone number three times before he got it right, hung up, and then fainted from hyperventilating.

Bahahahaha, this morning I did the Sch A seminar for a new client. She had 14 noncash contribution receipts with nothing on them. She figured that those treasures were worth $2200.00 Me: Your standard deduction is $12,600. That's the amount the IRS will allow you to deduct without itemizing your deductions. Your mortgage interest is $2,500, your property tax is $500, and let's say these non-cash contributions that are blank amount to $3,000. (No I did not mention sales tax, stay with me here.) I write the numbers down and show the sum is $6,000. Do you want to take the $12,600 or the $6,000 deduction? She: I don't know, are you allowed to give me advice? ISTG (I swear to G**) this happened. You cannot make this up. I will be filling out the Sch A to show her, and I wasted fifteen minutes on the seminar, too. The seminar took longer for her, as you might imagine. I'll charge her ten bucks for the two minutes to fill out Sch A, print it, copy it, BBFB. No, I ain't doing the 8283.

I, we ALL, hear you. I just escorted out the 92 year old, still driving, after hearing again and again and again about, well, her late husband dead 30+ years, where she went to college and how she had no idea where her SSA1099 was but she received the same amount every month, blah, blah, blah. And that was after the 78 year old with inheritance issues, I could go on but won't. Just know that you are not alone. I was planning 2 more seasons after this one. Might be rethinking that