HV Ken

We charge $5 for postage & handling. It takes additional time to package it up, drive to the post office, purchase the postage, etc. Never have had a complaint for doing this.

Nope, you have it backwards. You put it first on the E, and when you put the percentage on the E, that form sends the remainder to the A automatically.

Thanks KC - I believe that is what I did, but that is not happening as you describe. I must be doing something wrong, but can't determine what!

What is the magic to split Real Estate taxes between Schedule A and E. Client rents part of house - 25%.

There is a line on the Schedule A - Line 6 worksheet titled "Real estate taxes from Schedule E properties". Is this somehow used to send the remainder of the real estate taxes (the other 75%) from the Schedule E over to the Schedule A.

I know I can do the calculations myself, but was wondering if there is some automatic way to handle? I can't seem to get any value into this field (it is a linked field).

Thanks.

I would prefer a separate off topic area. I skip over the off topic posts anyway, so it will make it that much easier for me.

Now if we could also find a way to parse out the, how did KC put it, "sarcastic meaningless replies to sincere questions", that would be even better!

There are only two possible explanations I can think of:

1) You deleted the return in the Return Manager, or

2) you did it in a year other than the current tax year.

I am missing something. There is a return for this client in the Return Manager, just not in the E-file Manager?

Go to Preferences -> All Managers and see if you have a check in the box next to "Hide returns marked Complete..."

I guess I am curious to learn what your reluctance is to report what you described as a clear and blatant criminal? It is my understanding that you actually saw the evidence of the crime!

BUT I CAN'T FILE WITH THE EDUCATION CREDITS!!!

According to the MyATX web site, the 8863 is scheduled to be approved on 2/12/08.

This is of course not an ATX problem, but a government issue. See: http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=176605,00.html . Based on this article, it is not clear to me how ATX can do any better on this one. Sure their customer support is pitiful this year, but lets not let emotion override facts.

Here is part of that IRS article (Dec. 28, 2007):

The upcoming tax season is expected to start on time for everyone except for certain taxpayers potentially affected by late enactment of the Alternative Minimum Tax “patch.” Following extensive work in recent weeks, the IRS expects to be able to begin processing returns for the vast majority of taxpayers in mid-January. However, as many as 13.5 million taxpayers using five forms related to the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) legislation will have to wait to file tax returns until the IRS completes the reprogramming of its systems for the new law.

IRS has targeted Feb. 11, as the potential starting date for taxpayers to begin submitting the five-related returns affected by the legislation. The February date allows the IRS enough time to update and test its systems to accommodate the changes without major disruptions to other operations related to the tax season. See IRS News Release 2007-209 and these questions and answers for more information.

Returns that include the following forms cannot be filed until Feb. 11, 2008:

Form 8863, Education Credits

Form 5695, Residential Energy Credits

Schedule 2, Form 1040A, Child and Dependent Care Expenses for Form 1040A Filers

Form 8396, Mortgage Interest Credit

Form 8859, District of Columbia First-Time Homebuyer Credit

What are these billing notices people are reporting? I have not received one. I just checked the Billing Report at MyATX and it shows: No billing information was found for the office and billing period selected. I am using MAX - are the people seeing these notices using something different?

Pondering.... Isn't being aware of this and not reporting it no different than witnessing a crime (say a convenience store robbery) and not reporting that to the police? Previous posts in this thread indicate a number you can call anonymously, just like the police have a tip line to report details of a crime. Maybe it's just me, but I don't see the difference here between the two scenarios.

Figured this one out - the blurb is not included when a bank product is involved. Easy fix - I added the blurb to that one section in the wizard.

Er - isn't this community for ATX questions???

What I do for this is to duplicate the joint return twice - one for the taxpayer and one for the spouse. Then I remove all the spouse information from the taxpayer version, and visa versa. Very easy to do, doesn't take much time, and gives me three nice pictures and makes it easy to present to the client.

Thanks, but that is not it - I am all enrolled with HSBC. I called the HSBC ERO Hotline today, and they could not even tell me what that code means! The next day, after the iRAL was converted into a traditional RAL, and the acknowledgement came back from the IRS, I see the client has a debt code.

I was just hoping to get a definition of the BANKLD2017 code!

I have recently noticed that the "Where's My Refund" blurb is no longer getting added to my client letter (customized). Has anyone else noticed this?

Thanks jklcpa!

We had a client insist today on attempting an Instant RAL (were recently in major car accident and need the money). I have never done one of these, after submitting the application, it was rejected and the reason given is: BANKLD2017. This is with HSBC.

Does anyone know what BANKLD2017 stands for?

Thanks.

Believe it or not, I am e-filing our first return today. I noticed at least the initial value reported in the status field is different this year. Last year it was "Transmitted to ATX" then "Validated by ATX" then something like "Transmitted to Agency" and finally "Accepted".

Can someone describe the status values used through the submission cycle for a return that e-files successfully?

Created

\/

Validated by EFC

\/

__________

\/

__________

\/

Accepted

...please fill in the blanks!

Thanks.

I received my first one probably one week ago. Much to my surprise, a second one showed up yesterday!

After an e-mail to customer support, I received this as part of the e-mail reply:

If you need further assistance, please contact our Customer Support Department at 1-800-638-8291.

ATX Tip:

Tax Season support hours of operation are:

8AM - 10PM Monday through Friday

9AM - 5PM on Saturdays.

Now getting a customer support rep that knows more than how to spell ATX - that is another story.

Byron - I had no problem with that. The left and right arrows are there. It worked for me just as in previous tax years.

Have you found any way to get at the text variations within the different sections? You used to be able to go "sideways" at each step, with little left and right arrows to walk through the various text that's pulled in according to that client's results. Now there's no text to edit in the master form except a few barebones paragraphs.

In the state letter master the "sideways" is still there as before.

Well, after two hours talking to Technical "Support", and a couple of days exchanging emails, etc., I finally got a working copy of the Client Letter all on my own.

I attempted to see if I could reproduce the problem by starting over from scratch (deleting the problematic customized client letter master), by following a cycle of: only modifying one section at a time, saving, bringing the new version into a return; repeat. Unfortunately, I could not get the problem to reproduce. The good news is I now have a problem free client letter!

My suspicion as to what may cause the problem was checking any of the boxes in Step 4. My recommendation is to just leave those blank - they will get correctly applied by the individual return anyway.

The last technical "support" rep I spoke with was very nice, and it was quite evident that she had extremely little knowledge of the ATX product. I feel bad for them - this wasn't their idea and they don't like it any more than we do. I wish there was a way to get the message to corporate about how bad their decision was. I wasted two days on this problem and ended up having to be my own technical support.

Never mind - I found it - it is within the organizer.

Does anyone know if there is an Engagement Letter available within the program? My wife insists she stumbled across one last year, but I have been unable to find it.

Thanks for any pointers!