She said, ``You don't understand what I said''

[austin_dern]

My annual tax report, I suppose: for the first time, I did them with the aid of tax-preparation software. I had a couple motives for this, one being that I knew there was some tax credit for buying a new car but I knew no further details about it, and trusted that the software would know how to get it. Then, too, my mother bought a MacBook Pro last year, so the Turbotax she bought this year was Mac-compatible, and she offered me the free use of the software. (She probably did this earlier years, but I shy away from chances to use Windows when I don't have to.) Most of all, though, the state of New Jersey decided not to send tax form blanks out to the libraries, so I would have had to actually go to their web site and download and print out the forms.

I found the experience pretty good, really. I think it took me more time than filling it out by hand would have, if I'd known just what to do for the new-car purchase, but the series of basic, easy-to-check, easy-to-verify questions worked pretty well. I also liked watching the ongoing changes of the estimated tax return (or bill) based on the answers-so-far. It added an element of game show to the process. Also I was gratified to see that in Turbotax's estimate my risk of a non-random audit is so low they have to actually extend the scale to the left to cover it; here's hoping they're right.

Ultimately, the state of New Jersey ended up owing me $32, while I owed the United States $43. The close convergence between what I actually owed and what I paid felt somehow anticlimactic. Yeah, yeah, it's not supposed to be better to have your money earning interest in your accounts rather than be an interest-free 'refund' loan to the government, but, I can't say I would gain much utility from the interest on $32. This is also the first time I've owed taxes to the United States (I routinely owed in Singapore, as they don't have withholding), although I was somehow able to cover that bill. That, too, was paid electronically because I fortunately remembered the routing number and checking account for my United States bank.

I expect next year my taxes will be tricker as I've finally got royalty income as well as side income to account for, but for now, huh. That was all painless enough. It's a little disconcerting to start Turbotax up (not for the first time, but for my final do-you-really-want-to-send-this check) on the 13th of April and have it downloading updates, though.

Trivia: Andrew Johnson was the first vice-president to take the Presidential Oath of Office the same day as the president's death. Source: From Failing Hands: The Story of Presidential Succession, John D Feerick.

Currently Reading: The Death Of A President: November 1963, William Manchester. All about, well, you can imagine, but written nearly contemporary to the event. Curiously the cover is mostly naval blue, with a few white flecks that might be scratches in the dust jacket, but are so artistically arranged --- and so missing from the top and bottom inch of the cover --- that I'm not sure it's not done for effect.

Comments

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

I E-filed for the first time myself, using H&R Block online.. not quite tax-prep software in full, but combine with Mom's knowledge and paper forms on hand, it managed to work well. Got stonking big refunds too this year, but those should settle down for 2010 if I hold to one job.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

This is my first e-filing too, as in having no physical forms mailed in anywhere. I remember looking hard at filing-by-phone, back in grad school, when that looked like it was going somewhere, but I didn't like not having any traces of anything left over. This at least I could print out the computer-generated forms, although I actually just saved them as PDFs instead of putting them to real paper.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

Momgoose and I ended up with the paper forms anyway to work through, even though we e-filed.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I thought seriously about taking the data and filling it out by hand, although that would mean I'd have to download the state tax forms that set off my initial laziness anyway, and Turbotax prints out copies of the paper forms regardless. I'm amazed regularly at what I'll do in laziness.

[mondhasen.livejournal.com]

It's a little disconcerting to start Turbotax up... on the 13th of April and have it downloading updates, though.

:o) H&R Block did the same yesterday, offering me Federal updates: I filed Federal quite a while ago.

State was disappointing. It said I had taken some sort of depreciation deduction on my Federal, which I hadn't, and I couldn't get it to go away. I had to enter zeros until it went to the next step.

I love tax software and have used it now maybe three years running. But... it has made me lose touch with laws and explanations. Where I used to pore over forms and booklets I now just type in numbers and hope for the best. Admittedly, the first year I used the software I went from owing $600 when computing my own taxes to getting back about $1200 with them: this is why I still use it ;o)

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Really, they ought to just pretend there's nothing to update after a certain reasonable time before Tax Form Deadline Day.

You know, with software performance like that the first year, it'd be hard not to come back to it. I've wondered some what might have happened if I'd let software guide my 2007 and 2008 returns, but my tax situation is generally so simple it's hard to figure it'd come out any different. It's getting more interesting these days.