ATX2012SUCKS Posted January 25, 2013 Report Share Posted January 25, 2013 Thats from Austin Powers. Hello Group! It's tax season and I am helping my father-in-law get his computers setup with ATX 2012. Problems started when we noticed there where no forms available for download and have gotten worse. E.G. We imported data from ATX 2011 into 2012 and started working on the return. Then ATX sent a update down to the form we were using a we lost all our work even though it was saved. I explained to them they need to tell customers to close ATX or close it for them to prevent that and they said "oh its a known issue but has not been a big problem.....we do not see people complaining about it on our forums" So in general ATX 2012 is treating us very badly and the masterminds. I have looked at past questions so I how there will be no repeats. In order to help other users I will post them 1 at a time with good decriptive topics. In exchange for your help I am good at home repairs, most anything electroic, legos, and I am an IT consultant in the D.C. NOVA area Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack from Ohio Posted January 25, 2013 Report Share Posted January 25, 2013 At first look, it seems that you are not using ATX as it is designed. Importing instead of rollover will cause you trouble all the time. Look on the menu where the ATX program is listed. There is a 460 page DETAILED user guide that should be read. I have been the I.T. person here at the firm since tax year 2003. We have 2,900+ clients and have managed to have a relatively trouble free experience. There have been issues from time to time. I sense that you have not had many years of experience using ATX. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATX2012SUCKS Posted January 26, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 ATX Supreme Master You are correct I should have said Rollover not import. Thank you also for the kind way of saying RTFM. I have not used ATX very much and if you read my first post you would see that I am helping my father-in-law get it installed and running. I am not an accountant but he is and I just confirmed that he has been using ATX since the mid-90s when it was Saber and it growled at you when it loaded up. He does not appriciates your smart comment about the users manual and I am sure all your 2,900+ client have not read a 460 page manual. Funny thing is....he has an old Windows machine and we loaded up a few of the old copies. The moto of the company then was "why pay for expensive tax software when Saber and the TaxSolver CD is so easy to use" Your DETAILED users guide was 71 pages not 460 back then. I have attached it for those of you that would like to see how easy ATX was to use back in the day. I am just trying to get help from users on this group and I am certainly not looking to start an argument with the Supreme Master of ATX. ATX 2011 was a fine product its just been difficult to get 2012 up and running and having to wait 2 hours for tech support to figure out why Asset conventions get changed to Half Year from MQ1-4 only to have him say he will need to open a ticket to have it looked at (means its a bug/defect) and a bad one that if went unnoticed could get someone audited. If I could attach a file to this post I would have attached your help file from my FIL's 1996 copy of Saber. Pete formely ATXS *********************************************************************************************************************************************************** To: Mr. Master, ATX AKA From: Richard Payne I must say I would not expect the head of ATX's IT Department to behave in the manner which you do. My son-in-law is goofing on you because he is tried of working on issues with your 2012 software. He is tired of being on hold. He is tried of being hung up on. He is tried of waiting for people to call back that do not. He is nice enough to help me figure out what is going on with your 2012 product...I have read the entire 460 page manual and I could not find one bit of information on why the 2012 software deletes all your work in the 1120s form because you had a problem that needed an update and when my 1120s form was updated I lost all the work in there. I also had trouble finding out why you continue to update forms long after April 15th. E.G. You updated froms for ATX 2009 in late 2010. These returns are already filed with the IRS but if you try to recreate them you cannot because you've made changes to the forms. Why on earth would you update your software so that it produces a different return. Now sure I could turn updates off and have done so but there are forms updates that still get through. (Also not explained in the 460 page manual) Why in the world do you change a form used in a return that has already been submitted and on file with the IRS. I am 73; I've been a CPA for 46 years and an ATX customer since 1996. In closing I did not appreciate your rude smart$$ comments Mr. ATX Supreme Master nor do I expect will my ATX Account Representative when he receives the fax I just sent him with a long list of your past posts were you are continuously rude to other users on this forum. Sincerely, RP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack from Ohio Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 I have nothing to say except it is 2013, a digital age, a digital career we work in. Those who choose to adapt and learn will be driving the bus, and the rest will be riding. Not seeing evidence of reading every page of the manual.... Good Luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnH Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 I think we have another new participant who hasn't figured out that this is an independent forum and is not affiliated with ATX or CCH. In addition to not studying the manual, apparently he hasn't bothered to find out the facts about this forum either. (I'm not going to add a snide comment about the spell checker - that would be kinda tacky of me, wouldn't it ?) 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joanmcq Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Well, RP, since Jack doesn't work for ATX, I'm not sure what your account rep is going to do about his being a smarta$$ or not. He is another tax pro. A lot of us on here are ATX Supreme Masters-it's a joke because of how much we post. Common in online forums. Your grandson made a very rude first post, and his ability to write clearly in English is low. And I have no ideas what legos have to do with software or tax prep. Rude posts beget rude answers, and actually Jack was being kind. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevM Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 I agree with Jack.. this is 2013.. I am also an IT Guy and know for sure that any new software will need more Momery in this day and age. I do not delve on the old program of how great it waspeople just need to adjust to the new program. i have 8GM ram on my lap top and have installed on Server running 2008 wtih 4 workstations. I do not have any issues except it is slow loading the program. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SCL Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 jeez atx masters on this independent forum...cut the newbies some slack. even if they aren't sure what forum they are on, you know. i don't see what caused the hostility from the original post. yeah, they are somewhat late arrivals to the atx mess. still, they are having problems with the atx program and want some help... along with thousands of others. @atx2012sucks: i'll throw you a bone... you want - community.atxinc.com/forums - for the real atx website. be prepared to jump through hoops to login. there you will find many, many, many atx posters like you who are waiting for answers from atx. atx's latest promise for salvation, in a long list of failed promises, is an update on monday, 1/28/13. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Taxed Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 If ATX is giving you the nightmares this tax season, have you folks asked CCH to give you Taxwise Power package this season to tide you over? I have personally done a conversion of client files from ATX 2011 to Taxwise 2011 and it was 99% accurate and complete for 1040 returns. As a matter of fact I had even suggested that to CCH to avoid all the problems. Just give their loyal users an alternative within the family! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnH Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 What you just suggested may be their ultimate goal. But if it is, they sure chose a flawed process to pursue it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
schirallicpa Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Yes sometimes people are a little rough on each other on this forum. I've been beat up before myself. Hey - sticks and stones. But I don't think this guy said anything rude to begin with. And haven't we all been on here complaining about ATX this season. Spell checker? Use of English? Reallly? Seriously? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RitaB Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Yeah, I think it might be wise, considering all the problems many of us are having with ATX, to put a flashing sign up there somewhere with directions to the Official ATX Community. I tried to open the program this morning and it immediately closed, error messages were sent to somebody, maybe, probably Santa. I know I am not tech savvy, but I know how to double click an icon. It's them, not us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lion EA Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 We all have your same level of frustration, though each of us about the issue(s) that matter to us most. Most of us used ATX back in the day, and see this season's start as particularly rocky. We're all a bit crankier than our normal selves as we watch 30 January creep up on us when we're not as well prepared as prior years. You're welcome to report your problems, either from the IT perspective or from the tax preparer's. Those that have discovered work arounds will post to help you. Please also post the work arounds that worked for you and post when you have some help to offer on this or any thread. Also, read the related threads to mine some ideas for your own issues that might have been posted already. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Taxed Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Folks for whatever it is worth stay away from Windows 8 during the tax season. My son's laptop crashed running a simple quickbooks program! I am holding on to my trusted desktop with Win XP-Pro until someone takes it away from my "cold dead hands"! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcb39 Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Folks for whatever it is worth stay away from Windows 8 during the tax season. My son's laptop crashed running a simple quickbooks program! I am holding on to my trusted desktop with Win XP-Pro until someone takes it away from my "cold dead hands"! Isn't that the truth. XP is working fine, but I can't bump the ram up any higher on that one. However, ATX was working well on my Win 7 laptop last year and this year so far so good on both. New machine is Win 7 and just maxed out the ram at 16G, which I shouldn't have to do on a brand new i5 computer. Laptop has 3G and is holding its own, but have another G ordered which will max that one out. I would never even consider 8 for a business machine and especially not at this early release date. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joanmcq Posted January 26, 2013 Report Share Posted January 26, 2013 Me neither. And if you search my posts from 2009, you'll see asking about Win 7, 64bit, and how the programs responded before I bought my desktop with Win 7, 64bit. When I bought my system, knowing ATX is a resource hog, I bought with future years in mind and got the beefiest system I could afford. 9GB ram (expandable to 16 or more?), the i7 processor, and 750GB hard drive. No fancy bells & whistles, no blu-ray, just a good solid business machine. My old 2005 vintage XP laptop works fine, but even iTunes in it's current version maxes out the processor. Those of you running systems with low RAM & slower processors might want to use this method when buying your new computer. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pacun Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 To the original poster.... please use manual updates of the forms and run the program after you have opened it and don't open any clients until the update has taken place. I normally do two updates a day during Jan and Feb and I do one daily. Automatic updates could cause some damage from time to time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pacun Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 By the way, nice topic and nice name you have chosen. With a topic and name like those, I think you got a warm welcome after all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lloyd Hudson Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 I have to put my 2 cewnts in here. I have using ATX since 1997. At this point I am running 3 Win7 workstations from a server. I have one (1) workstiation that will almost work on a rollovered return. My personal workstation will always crash the program or be unable to open return due to "mismatch form" error. I installed the Program when it first arrived in late November. Multiple trips to Customer service and few successes at getting to Tech support. Frustrated, you bet, Jack I am glad you got yours working. But when somebody starts venting stop and think about what your are saying. I do know ATX and no I did not read the manual anymore than I have for any other software or the prior 15 years of ATX. I have had IT look at the server and the workstations. Ram and processors all meet the specs as suggested by CCH and ATX. At the moment my revenue is down over $7000.00 ytd due to inability to open returns. I can initate a new return, Transcribe all the prior years info from the prior years but lose the time and continuity that should be afforded by rolling a return forward. Tomorrow will be my breaking point. Although I cannot say that I have decided what I am going to do at this point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joanmcq Posted January 29, 2013 Report Share Posted January 29, 2013 Did you install the program on the server? Or one of the workstations? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevM Posted January 29, 2013 Report Share Posted January 29, 2013 Once updated you also need to run Netsetup on each workstation. I have same setup as you (Server running 2008 and 3 workstations running Win 7) Each time I do update on the server then run Netsetup (Especially with Program Updates) and haven't had any issues sofar. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.