CathysTaxes

TRX has sent me a renewal postcard and 4 email requests. I got my refund through my credit card company. As for PayPal, they are very specific about their deadline, 45 days, no exceptions, so I doubt if they care.

I guess it went OK. The stress and time wasted on TRX could have gone to obtaining new business. I also had a lower tolerance for the PITA clients who were 'needy' of my time and cheap when it came to my fees. One of them was 'fired' because I didn't feel like putting up with his crap this year.

Today, they sent me a renewal email.

It felt like April Fools when I started reading my renewal letter that arrived today. Especially since I did get an email from Karen that they were offering a credit for next year.

I think I figured out when this happens. Last year, in Taxworks, I had several folders set up and some of the returns with duplicated and used for certain scenarios. It seems that clients with a duplicated return had the strange NOL.

I won't be renewing for awhile. I received my copy of Taxwise from Ultimate Tax Software. They have two other tax software applications that I will probably want to demo first. Taxwise works, but it's cumbersome.

I'm not that trusting with tax software. Every year, the developers have to jump through hoops to put in the last minute changes that those idiots in Washington pass at the last minute. The last two years, the idiots have been taking longer and the IRS wasn't ready for returns until much later. Add to that, they have to support all of the states (and counties and cities) that have income tax). To that, there's the yearly form changes and other new laws. I develop applications, so I know the work involved, I don't think I'd ever try to handle coding tax software.

Last year, I noticed a very serious booboo on a previous year's return. I have no idea why a warning message wasn't issued, nor why the IRS would accept the return The statutory employee indicator was accidently clicked for a self employed taxpayer who DID NOT have a W2. The result was Schedule SE wasn't created and taxpayer didn't pay any SE tax. Now I go through each return by myself plus with the client before efiling.

Credit card company just issued me a credit. YIPEE!

As a parent of a developmental disabled child, it makes my skin crawl to see the term 'retarded' used in this fashion.

Taxwise has been pretty stable. My real issue was when I had the option with the history lists. I would enter in something not on the list and it kept defaulting to an item on the list, so I turned off the feature and it's been working OK.

The client letters are a real PITA (much better than TaxExact). Taxworks had a Bank Account Confirmation page, Engagement Letters, Privacy document, etc. I've created client 'letters' for these. I do not like how it handled pricing state returns. You have to manually enter in those forms so you can bill your client.

I have used TaxWise for about ten years as a IRS TaxAide volunteer. The annoying lack of seamless support for foreign dividends has been there since day one. In my opinion, one reason that TaxWise is so slow to change ANYTHING is the massive support and training effort that the IRS would have to go thru to retrain all of the IRS employees and volunteers that use TaxWise. I know of no other tax software for which the IRS publishes a training and usage manual (Pub 4012.)

[by the way, the on-line version of TaxWise (TWO) works like a charm. The same lack of support for foreign dividends of course, but both products are STABLE.]

I hadn't thought of that being the reason why Taxwise has relatively few new features since the last time I used it (first two years I was with TRX, I used Taxwise, then Taxworks for 2 years).

Never mind, found it.

I asked Taxwise and all they said was to do a right click on line 7.

Roberts, that's a great idea to use this discussion to report issues. Thanks

Folks on this board will remember TRX and the characters associated with that company for a log time. But taxpreparers who do not frequent this board are most likely to get trapped with another "brand" launched by the new company or its associates. I think a good rule of thumb before you signup for another software is to google search and see what comes up. Just try doing that under ATX or TRX and see the stuff it digs up!!

Agreed, but you have to remember that ATX and Taxworks had/have serious issues with their software as well for year 2012. At least, getting a refund from them was a lot easier, but their customers have gone through a lot of hell also.

I agree with Taxed with a few exceptions.

I have attempted in the past to solicit all whom would be interested in procuring TaxWorks at a favorable price and received at best 10 responses. As you point out there could be hundreds if not thousands that would potentially participate however my suggestion of emailing all who have posted on this board in the past would no doubt reach many more than 10?

In addition I do already have the attention of an executive at TaxWorks whom I have had numerous dialogues with in the past.

If we can muster even 100 interested parties I am confident that I couls convince TaxWorks to make us an offer that we all can't refuse!

Thanks

Mike Dubin CPA

Mike, I sent you a PM.

Taxwise doesn't convert state information. So far, the depreciation has been converted OK.

Hmm, this has happened to me as well. Yesterday, I had opened up the Taxwise converted version of the 2011 Taxworks return that had a strange NOL. I noticed that the converted return was not complete! Most of the Schedule C income was gone, so the return showed negative taxable income, thus the NOL was created.

I did an override.

I just reported a bug to TaxWise (I'm on hold now). If you have a return and the taxpayer is being claimed as a dependent on another return, then on Form IL1040, line 10b if someone else claimed you on their return, the calculation is using Illinois previous exemption amount of $2000 instead of the 2012 exemption amount of $2050. You will need to override the exemption from 0 to 1 or the taxpayer will have to pay taxes that they shouldn't have.

IKWYM. I have this from my Business Use of Home CPE:

A home office will qualify as a taxpayer's principal place of business for deducting
expenses for its use if the taxpayer meets the following requirements:
The taxpayer uses it exclusively and regularly for administrative or
management activities of his trade or business.
The taxpayer has no other fixed location where the taxpayer conducts
substantial administrative or management activities of his trade or business.

Thanks for the input.

This guy is in sales. His company is in NY and he lives in IL, so I do believe the home office is legit. Plus it helps that I knew him personally.

I went into last year's Taxworks program and sure enough, if you linked the home office worksheet to form 2106, it transferred the real estate and mortgage interest to Schedule A.

Just a FYI. In Taxworks, when you linked the home office form to form 2106, it transferred the mortgage interest and real estate taxes to Schedule A. In Taxwise, it does not, you have to do it manually.

Taxworks was easy to use and had a lot of nice features. Nice user interface. Taxed, I'm also a computer programmer and sometimes, software applications need to be reengineered. The application used to create the application, may no longer be supported, so software firms have to upgrade to the new application. This takes time and a lot of testing. I just converted to applications that I developed in Microsoft's Visual Basic 6.0 (a great application development tool - which is no longer supported by Microsoft) to Visual Basic 2008.Net (an entirely different application) and it took some time and a lot of testing.

I got this reject message on an Illinois Full Year Resident with wages in IL, IN, and KS:

ILCR-200-1 - SchILCR Step 2 Line 1 Column A 'Wages' minus SchILCR Step 2 Line 1 Column B 'NonILWages' must not be less than the sum of all occurrences of FormIRSW2 Line 16 'StateWagesAmt' when FormIRSW2 Line 15 'StateAbbreviationCd' equals 'IL' and SchILCR Step 6 Line 50 'IowaBox', 'KentuckyBox', 'MichiganBox', and 'WisconsinBox' are blank.

The state wages on the W2 are as follows:

IL - 103,713.

IN - 15,617

KS - 818

Wages in box 1 - 107,011.

Obviously, the total of the 3 states is 120,140. The client's payroll person had this to say:

”Basically it was validated by the State of Illinois that regardless of where you work (unless there is reciprocity) all Illinois residents must have IL SIT taxable wages for 100% of earnings. They are also subject to SIT Taxable wages in the state in which they are earned. Making IL the only Double taxation state in the US of A. “

Another forum suggested that I change the state wages for IL on the W2. When I did that last year, the client received a notice from IL asking for additional tax. This is what that forum (it was for an Intuit product) stated:

Open Form W-2 Worksheet and verify the amounts of wages sourced to Illinois is equal to the amount of Illinois Schedule CR, Line 1A less Line 1B.
If the total Illinois sourced amount is greater than Illinois Schedule CR, Line 1A less Line 1B, enter the adjusted amount in the Form W-2 Box 16 so the Illinois wages do not total more than Schedule CR Line 1A less Line 1B.

Make the appropriate change and re-submit the return electronically. However, if the reject continues you may want to contact the Illinois DOR for additional information or file this return via U.S. Mail. To file your state return, print it and mail it to the Illinois taxing authority.

Has anyone experienced this?

I for one will never purchase another tax software program in advance.

Neither will I. I will wait maybe until November to make my decision.