Customer Reviews

H&R Block Taxcut 2006 Premium Federal + State Win/Mac

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(25)

 

 

I used to be VERY happy with TurboTax, going back to the DOS days. I'm finally giving it up due to increasingly frequent tech problems over the last few years.

Before you switch from Tax Cut, compare the prices: they want $45 for Fed+State; Tax Cut wants $30. NEITHER product includes free filing for tax year 2006.

Macintosh support from Tax Cut (apparently missing last year) is back, and others have reviewed it under this product.

Current Turbo Tax users (tax year 2006) are reporting that they are unable to import from prior-year Tax Cut, nor do the Turbo Tax specs say they can.

If you are installing Turbo Tax on a Windows 98 machine, your installation will immediately abort & it will print out instructions for mailing the product back to them for a refund in 8 weeks.

Footnote/suggestion for those wanting to save money: Just buy the basic package, then file on paper; if you file paper in February/March, before the rush, your refund comes back in about 10 days--almost as fast as with e-file. Then do your state return by hand: most state returns are a page or two with numbers taken right off the federal form; just use your prior-year return as a guide if you get stuck.

Seeing how Turbotax increased their prices this year I thought I'd save myself a few bucks by trying TaxCut Premium Federal+State for the first time. The box says it is compatible with Mac OS X and will import data from last year's TurboTax returns so I gave it a try.

I installed the program on my Mac and opened it to start my return. I have a fairly complex return so importing last year's data is a helpful timesaver. Unfortunately, after many attempts I was never able to import anything, not even my name. I called their customer service and tried all kinds of solutions to no avail. They said someone from their "escalation team" would contact me within 24-48 hours. Eight days later there was no news from them so I called back. They had no record of my case and I had to go through the whole explanation all over. Once again their rep had no clue how to fix the problem and gave me a phone number to call for further assistance or a refund.

I called the number and once again no case number! A third round of explanations with another service rep and his manager followed with no solution and no money back. Now I must wait for someone in their "escalation team" to contact me a fourth time but they will not provide a timeframe for the call.

The delays in response, their inability to track a case number, their weak product knowledge and their reluctance to provide a refund after this much hassle make this a poor product in my opinion.

UPDATE:

A quick update for fairness' sake on my review. Three weeks after my first attempt to use TaxCut I finally figured out what went wrong.

It turns out TaxCut cannot import TurboTax files with password access. I had to disable the password setting on last year's Turbotax and was then able to import data. The second reason I could not import last year's files is because two different customer service reps told me the file had to end in .t05 and NOT .tax. Well, as it turns out, the latter file is the one that works. A line or a note about this on the "Import last years data" screen would have saved a lot of hassles.

I have not finished my return yet but so far the software seems reasonably good. Turbotax seems to have more resources handy if you don't understand a question (IRS instructions, their own take, etc.) and TurboTax also imports data from brokerages which is helpful.

(TaxCut on a Mac OS X Panther user).

This year they stopped paying for the federal online "e-file" - worth $15. So have the other guys, but... now that they know you're hooked on efiling, they've quietly removed that benefit.
I think the federal government should pay us for doing all the data entry for them!

For the second year in a row, our "friends" at H&R Block, have offered their complete software in 1 box for 1 reasonable price. The catch as always as if you lived in 2 states, you have to get to 2 state programs via download (and the second will cost extra). 2 kickers to be aware of this year however. 1) It appears this time you can't get your first state (the one that comes as bought) until you are ready to process your state return. 2) The CD with the free e-file is now sold as a separate identity, if you wanna e-file using this version, you have to pay for it during installation. By the way speaking of paying on installation, H&R Block is mailing copies out to people who registered the software in past years (they did this last year as well). These mailed out copies are NOT free. You have to pay for them on installation. Fortunately, they email you a "receipt" with an "activation code" so if you have to uninstall and reinstall the disc, you don't have to pay again, just insert the cd and enter the code. Still and all, I have been using this since it has come our I think in 2000, and it is as always user friendly and a lot less expensive than Turbotax. Definietly, a big help to doing taxes at home.

I'd been using Tax-Cut since 1998 on MAC platforms. Tax-Cut abandoned MAC users for 2005 taxes, so I was forced to Turbo-Tax. This was a pain because I had to re-enter information from scratch, as opposed to reading in from the prior year. I found turbo-tax not any better than Tax-cut in 2005. I have a mix of self employment incomes, some rent etc, requiring lots of forms but I am no business owner.

For 2006, I emailed TaxCut to see if the '06 software could read the MAC '04 resturns. Answer=NO. So, I was going to use Turbo-Tax again. However, Turbo-Tax had done the dirty this year, and divided their premium software by forms (schedule C, then rentals), so I'd have to buy the most expensive "small business" Turbo-Tax software, as opposed to just the premium package (even though other reviewers note that its not really for small business). The price differential of the Schedule C Turbo-Tax, with Tax-Cut is really very large. On the other hand, returning to the Tax-Cut web-site is omenous in that the "FAQ" and software demonstration portions are "To be developed". However, I don't like monopolies, so I decided to give Tax-Cut another try, figuring I can go back and buy Turbo-Tax if necessary.

I haven't seriously started '06 taxes yet, but I am pleasantly surprised with '06 Tax-cut Premium Federal + State. It looks to be the same as the MAC '04 version. Better still, it actually read in a bunch of simple '05 Turbo-Tax returns from my minor children. However, it could not read my '05 Turbo Tax return for some reason (will try some more). Having not expected to be able to read in any of last years data however, I feel I am at least ahead to some extent.

There are complaints by other purchasers about new e-filing charges for Tax-Cut. I don't e-file, so I am unaffected. If the IRS wants a 30-page return with circular nonsensical computations that are so complax that we are forced to buy software and a computer to process it, then they should have the courtesy to read those 30-pages. You would think we should get a tax-break for e-filing, or the IRS would pay e-filing charges considering the effort it must save.

Bottom line: This will work. If you don't want a Turbo-Tax monopoly, this is a choice.

Unlike years past, H&R Block (founded by a guy named Bloch) decided to charge $16 for each e-file, Federal or state. Only one version, "Premium Federal+State+E-file" includes a "free" Federal e-file and state e-file; but that version costs $70, so there's no free lunch at all. Seriously, $16 is a lot to pay for e-filing. There are websites that give you completely free e-filing; my favorite is TaxAct (at taxactonline dot com). With TaxAct, you get the complete Federal plus state package for $7.95, which includes e-filing. Or you can use their standard package to prepare Federal and e-file for free, with *NO* income restriction!

I don't work for any of these companies, nor any tax-related company, nor any such entity. I just don't think it's right for H&R Block to charge customers such a ridiculously high fee for e-filing, whereas people can e-file for free elsewhere. BTW, if you use Taxcut to prepare your return, you'll have to use H&R Block's e-filing service if you want to e-file; you can't just take your file to another website and expect that website to do it for you. I used TaxAct in the past and they are very dependable. You can find reviews of TaxAct products in major magazines and on major websites.

Good luck.

I use windows xp. I've used taxcut for the past 2 years and turbotax prior to that. My return contains w2s, sched C + 1099s. I track everything in quicken and with my own excel spreadsheet. Start to finish my taxes took 30 minutes. No crashes, no issues.

The things I didn't like were:
* the video about "whats new for 2006" took too long to start playing. I don't care about flashy rotating graphics -- just tell me the dope!
* comparing your return to last year's return doesn't sort 1099s by name, it uses numerical order. So if you delete 1099 #1 everything is off by 1.
* software update leaves the "update your software" window open such that its a little unclear if you need to punch more buttons. they should either close the window or use a modal dialog.

I don't know whats up with these 2 star reviews, except for the mac folks who may have valid gripes and the guy with the ESPP complaint. You people who thought e-file was free previously... uh get a clue. Taxcut was $40 last year to cover it. Its _never_ been free.

Lastly its really obvious that the turbotax beta people were all instructed to review the product. I think that is unethical and it makes me wonder if they're stacking the deck over here as well.

I used Turbo Tax for many years and every year it got better and better. Then I tried Tax Cut for two years in a row and was surprised how much clumsier of a program it was to use. I even ran into situations where I had to override TaxCut's built in methods to get certain things done correctly. I've never had to do so with Turbo Tax. I finally wrote on my file folder where I collect receipts for the coming tax years "Do Not Buy Tax Cut" so that I wouldn't forget.

If you are doing a simple tax return then almost any software will do, but if you have a more complex return with rental properties, investments, trusts or anything else beyond normal wage and salary income and the common deductions then TurboTax is IMO the way to go.

If your needs are fairly straightforward, then saving a few bucks by getting TaxCut might be OK.

I have used TaxCut fairly happily ever since it first came out, I think it was 1998. But after my experience this year, never again. When the program transferred my state tax payments to my state tax form, it posted one of the tax payments from my W-2s twice, making it look like I was going to get a refund, when actually I owed taxes. I just happened to catch the error, then had to spend about an hour manually reviewing my entire return to make sure they weren't pulling the extra payment from somewhere else. Then the program would not let me override the error. When I called customer service, they simply told me to override the problem. (They made no attempt to explain why the error occurred and were completely unconcerned that the program had figured my taxes wrongly.) When I told them the program would not permit me to override, a "manager" came on the line who told me, rudely, I was either stupid or lying. When I offered to email him a screenshot to verify the problem, he hung up on me.

Fortunately, my state has an easy-to-use online program of its own to do simple returns directly on the web, so I just went there and completed my return. (The state's program, incidentally, verified that my manual posting was correct and TaxCut's was wrong.)

In fairness, the customer service number was answered promptly, and, except for the rude manager, the agents were polite and really tried to help. But the bottom line is, what good is a tax program that posts the wrong numbers? If I hadn't caught this error, I would owe additional taxes and possibly a penalty when the state caught it. Next year it's TurboTax for me, and I'll do my state return directly online.

But if you enjoy paying someone to figure your taxes wrongly, and then abuse you when you point it out to them, you may want to consider TaxCut.

Puchased, install on Win XP PC - good.
Update software over Dial-up internet ~ 35 mins OK
Imported last years TurboTax data - looked fine - Great!
Enter some data then tried to import tax info from Fidelity Brokerage Account. Could not find feature.
Contacted "Live" support over internet. Waited about 15 mins. After some boiler plate answers and 15 more mins of waiting, answer - TaxCut does not offer that feature in any of this years products. Bummer. Puchased much more expensive TurboTax. Imported tax info from brokerage firm.