H&R Block’s TaxCut Online software doesn’t support tax filings for civil union couples, as two Connecticut men have found out. The ACLU has sent a demand letter to the company asking it to change its system. The ACLU also states “Although the tax requirements for couples with civil unions in Connecticut are very similar to the requirements for married gay couples in Massachusetts, H&R Block’s online tax preparation service seems to accommodate married gay couples there.”
Hmm. Maybe . . . but if so, they have a few improvements to make. Here’s what I get after I start my TaxCut Online return:
What’s a married Massachusetts lesbian to do? I suppose I should click “Single,” since this is the federal part of my return. It’s unclear whether this information will carry over to my state return, though.
When I click the “Guide Me” button, I get this:
Not much help. Neither is their Help button, which leads to nothing about same-sex relationships.
Let’s compare with TurboTax Online:
Ah ha. A same-sex option. Easy enough for us Mass. residents. What if I were in Connecticut? Let’s click “Explain This.”
If I now choose to “Read about same-sex relationships,” I get a whole bunch of helpful information that tells me exactly what a married/CU’d/DP’d couple needs to do, creating a dummy married Federal form and such.
Even better, when I select “I was in a same-sex marriage,” I get a screen that informs me it will be easier and cheaper if I install the TurboTax software rather than using the Web version:
This software isn’t perfect, as I detailed in a previous post, but it’s a darn sight better than TaxCut, at least in handling same-sex relationships. Rather than telling me to go to an office and shell out an additional $150, as H&R Block does, they’re telling me how to save money.
Which software will Helen and I use? That’s a simple deduction.
(Full disclosure: I am not a tax professional and have not evaluated either software’s ability to manage detailed aspects of one’s taxes.)
Thank you for this, after almost ten years, I guess we will be switching software!
I used to work for a company that did tax software for State government. I would NEVER use Tax Cut. It is confusing and doesn’t cover everything. we bought it to compare to Turbo Tax one year and found that Turbo Tax identified more deductions (that year Tax Cut didn’t even ASK about mortgage interest, and um, THAT is a pretty basic deduction to be missing). Unless they have done a MASSIVE overhaul of their software, Tax Cut just isn’t worth the $$ in my opinion.