Don in Upstate NY

Kinda old for a student. Is he still an undergraduate?

Isn't that exactly opposite of what happened last year? Weren't the TRX orders for ATX actually shipped and supported by CCH? (As a TRX TaxWise customer I could log into the CCH TaxWise support site to download federal updates or new states. I could also track errant e-files thru the CCH site. My understanding was that only human contact had to be done thru TRX.)

Sounds like a good idea. They'll have to file by paper anyway.

OK. This is a normal distribution from an IRA. It is ALL taxable, unless your client had made a non-deductible contribution to the IRA sometime in the past. In that case he should have filed a form 8606 when he made the contribution. Not many people made non-deductible contributions to their IRAs, as there was no immediate tax benefit in doing so. Someone who did make such a contribution would have had to been financially astute to do it, and would likely remember it. Ask your client if he ever made a non-deductible contribution -- if he says 'no' or looks like he doesn't understand the question, then it's all taxable. If he says 'yes', ask him for his latest 8606. Then you fill out an 8606 for this year to calculate the taxable amount, and the amount of basis carryover.

Non-tax response: Just what every young woman wants - to share a home with her mother-in-law.

It's spring! The snow is all gone. The buoys are in the river. I've seen robins and kayaks. And I've only got two returns on extension. Life is good. :rolleyes:

>> But, the Supreme Court, you say? What a paperwork nightmare. << Don't be too impressed. Here in New York, the "Supreme Court" is one of the lower levels in the state court herarchy. It is a court of original determination, not of appeals. Pretty chart at http://www.courts.state.ny.us/courts/structure.shtml

I'm not sure they don't qualify. From Tax Tips 2010-27

The box on the 8453 is there, and has been there ever since the form was issued in September 2009. If it disappeared from your software it must be an ATX thing. http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8453.pdf

Not quite. Part III starts with line 19, where you enter the distribution. But you do not include any distribution that is made after you are 59-1/2 as long as you had made a contribution or conversion to a Roth in 2004 or before. This defines qualified distributions - you don't enter them. Then the instructions say that if there is nothing on line 19, you don't fill out the rest of Part III either, but just enter the gross distribution on the 1040 line 15a. So if you followed the instructions literally, you would file a blank 8606 for qualified Roth distributions.

New York income is defined as federal income plus specific NY additions less specific NY subtractions. So New York would have to take some positive action NOT to conform with any federal changes, which to my knowledge they have never done. Anything is possible however (we need the money!).

Mortgage interest (including points) is deductible on your main and one other personal residence. Points paid on your main home may be deducted in the year paid; points on a secondary home must be pro-rated over the life of the loan. See the details on page 158 of Pub 17.

Pub 17 and Pub 596 both discuss how to claim EIC if you have applied for, but don't yet have, a valid SSN. From Pub 596 ...

Do you mean he paid $60,000 for the stocks currently in his IRA or do you mean that he did not take any tax deductions for the $60,000 and filed a Form 8606 every year instead?

That's why I couldn't e-file this one ... My W2

Agree. Bauersmith, Bauerschmidt and Bauer are all the same as far as matching goes. One trick that most of us have learned -- if the last name on the return is entered as "Smith-Jones" that will match either SMITH or JONES in the SSA database. That's the classical way to e-file when the spouse hasn't gotten around to caanging her name with SSA, or uses her maiden name with some of her employers.

Now there's a phrase one seldom sees anymore! Extra credit for raising the literary tone of the forum. [On topic] A resales relationship can make good business sense for both parties if it brings in additional customers, and if the price difference is reasonable in relationship to the expenses no longer incurred by the primary vendor. The waters muddy quickly when the product comes with various options and has a list price that may or may not represent what clients actually pay. By buying from TRX I enjoyed one year of Intellitax and two years of TaxWise at very reasonable prices. I never did and would not have bought either of these products from their original vendors at their list prices. I have renewed for next year - the TRX product (which they are not advertising using its colorful name) seems to be an acceptable choice.

Now I see the confusion - there are two different exceptions to the penalty due to medical expenses ... Exception 05 applies to qualified retirement plans [e.g. 401(k)] for medical expenses in excess of 7.5% of your AGI, and Exception 07 applies to IRAs for medical insurance premiums while unemployed. It's all in the instructions for form 5329.

It's working ahead of schedule at My link Don

True, but a revocable living trust should not have it's own EIN in that case. The earnings would all be reported under the SSN of the grantor.

Do you mean that he closed out the Roth Account and only received $100 as a distribution, or that he sold the stock within the Roth account and only received $100?

Oh boy! I remember that one. It was painful to fix, even with tech support. IntelliTax used the Microsoft SQL server as its engine. From my few notes on the fix it looked like I had to uninstall IntelliTax, uninstall Microsoft SQL, run some (at this point unknown) system patch routines, reinstall SQL and finally reinstall IntelliTax. Since you don't have the capability of installing IntelliTax, this doesn't seem like a viable solution even if I had all the details. This apparently is a common problem in many applications that use the MS SQL engine. Google "database in single user mode" - maybe something there will be of help. As for me, I have an older Dell running Windows 2000 that sits in the basement in case I ever have to run Intellitax again. Theoretically there are also working copies of Pencil Pushers from the mid-90s on it. I doubt I'll ever know for sure. Don

That (or using an equivalent program) is probably the best way to do it. If you install from the original disks you won't have any of the updates that came out during the years. And you won't be able to download them because Intellitax and its support servers are dead.

These were returns in which the credit was more beneficial that the deduction, right? If the deduction were more beneficial the IT-272 results would flow to the itemized worksheet on page 2 of the IT-201 and nothing would show up on the IT-272 credit line on page 4.

I don't know about any SAAS version of ATX, but the SAAS version of TaxWise (CCH Small Firm Services sister product) is online and in (limited?) production use this season by customers buying the software through the IRS master contract (VITA, AARP/TCE). There is one site in Central New York that is using the on-line version exclusively this season. We have been told that TWOL (TaxWise On Line) is intended to replace the desktop version in future years, especially at the VITA/TCE sites. Security is the driver - laptops get stolen and an encrypted drive is no challenge if the password is written on a sticky note. (We have one site that is still e-filing thru a dial up modem, so it may be a while ... )