turbo tax

[bobslost]

Has anyone used turbo tax business addition. My tax preparer has retired and I have been looking for another . My son is convince turbo tax is the way to go.

[MinUph]

I use to use it for years when in business it was easy if you use qbooks. I still use ttax deluxe for personal.

[byhammerandhand]

My wife is a retired CPA, before that, an Enrolled Agent, and has been doing taxes for almost 35 years, more than half of that professionally.  It varied from walk-ins at H&R Block to business owners (car dealers, beer distributors, professionals like doctors and lawyers) at a regional CPA firm.   She uses HRBlock Tax Cut for us, with business and some complicated investments.  What she's heard is that they are nearly equivalent, with a slight edge to Turbo Tax for very complicated taxes.   She said her tax background may make that difference a moot point (for us).  Her memory is that Turbo Tax is a bit more expensive.

I'm really glad I convinced her to take a tax class in 1979.

[JuneC]

I've used and been frustrated by Turbo Tax on more than one occasion, but will probably use it again this year.  It has serious issues, year after year, for calculation of retained earnings.  But Taxact isn't any better.  They all have their issues.  Since Turbo Tax and Quickbooks are both by Intuit their integration should be seamless, but I've found that I need to treat them as if they were from different companies.  I don't "upload" anything into Turbo Tax.  It's about as good as you'll get for a DIY tax package, but don't expect it to be easy.  I have a Bachelor's in Accounting and the dang thing will make me curse.  While you're working, keep a browser session open at IRS.GOV to look up all the stuff they don't explain  :'(

June

[gene]

If you are a sole proprietor or your company is an LLC then the only difference between you and an employee is that you fill out Schedule C for profit and loss from a business.

And, you pay self employment tax: SS, Medicare.

If you have complicated tax returns you may want to use a tax preparer for this first year "on your own" to make sure you don't miss anything important.

In regards to Turbo Tax, you can google the question and there are reviews by tax people about the different tax softwares available and the pluses and minus. I've used it for many years mainly because it was on sale at Office Depot years ago and I bought it and have tended to keep on using it.

gene

[kodydog]

Like Hammer I am fortunate to have married an accountant.

One very busy year we used a CPA who missed a big deduction. Van depreciation. My thinking is these people are swamped this time of year and may miss a deduction or two.

Although it takes my wife several weeks to look up all the information she enjoys working with numbers and finding deductions to make our taxes lower. She also can build spread sheets to show where expenses are going and how much our overhead is. She uses QuickBooks Pro.

[Mojo]

We are an LLC and use Turbo tax. As Gene stated you can use TT for personal and business if your a Sub S or LLC.

Chris

[sofadoc]

Several years ago, my tax preparer announced that she was retiring, and would do my taxes one final time.

Before sending in that return, I bought a copy of TT, did my own return, and compared them. The two were almost identical. Been doing my own ever since. Some years Turbo Tax, some years H&R Block Taxcut. Whatever is handy at the checkout counter.

The only thing I don't like about H&R Block Taxcut, is that I have to adjust the screen resolution on my laptop so it will fit. I don't have to do that with TT.

[MinUph]

To touch n Sofas comment. My first year in business I used an accountant. I looked over what they had done and how much I had paid them and from that day on I did my own each year. And this was way before TT or computers. It use to take me hours and hours but now about an hour or so. Technology is great.