Tax software deals

[mickj]

The offer is still available, i couldn’t get it with the original link provided, i had to search Amazon myself

[JoeWras]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mickj The offer is still available, i couldn’t get it with the original link provided, i had to search Amazon myself

Confirmed as of 7:30 AM EST. Search was "Tax software 2020 federal & state"

[camfused]

Mods: do we need to threads on tax software deals?

[braumeister]

Threads merged.

[Amethyst]

Yay! I found it, too. There is one review, a critical one...we don't have an EV (yet) so I am not worried.

J. Kim
1.0 out of 5 stars Form 8911 Missing - Don't buy if you plan to EV Charging Credit
Reviewed in the United States on November 14, 2020
Platform: Mac DownloadEdition: Deluxe + StateVerified Purchase
I'm very disappointed that HRB did not include form 8911 (Alternative Fuel Vehicle Refueling Property Credit). Not sure why they left this form out when the IRS approved it back on 2/18/2020. I recommend you try other software if you plan to apply for the EV charging credit for your home.
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It's odd that the Deluxe + State is on sale for $22.99, while the Deluxe Federal Only (which is what we, as Florida residents, actually need) is on sale for $24.97. I'm not seeing any advantage to buying the Federal Only.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeWras Confirmed as of 7:30 AM EST. Search was "Tax software 2020 federal & state"

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

Wow. I don't remember the last year I did tax return by hand. I definitely remember running tax software on Win 3.1. Was there ever any tax program for MSDOS

I'm pretty sure there was, I think it was called Personal Tax Edge by Parsons Technology, before Intuit bought them out sometime in the early 90's. I'm not really a hoarder but I bet I could find that disc, I still have all my old tax records dating back to 1979.

[JoeWras]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RetiredAndLovingIt Wow. I don't remember the last year I did tax return by hand. I definitely remember running tax software on Win 3.1. Was there ever any tax program for MSDOS I'm pretty sure there was, I think it was called Personal Tax Edge by Parsons Technology, before Intuit bought them out sometime in the early 90's. I'm not really a hoarder but I bet I could find that disc, I still have all my old tax records dating back to 1979.

Tax Edge was the first software I used in the early 90s. Yes, it started with DOS. Bob Parsons is a "unique" guy. He could have retired on this program alone, but instead became a billionaire with GoDaddy.

[JoeWras]

Just for the fun of it. Remember any of these from 1991? Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/11/12/s...-programs.html

Quote:

We've seen six early-bird tax programs so far: Andrew Tobias's Taxcut 1040 ($89.95 from MECA Software Inc. of Fairfield, Conn.), Taxcut EZ/A ($29.95, also from MECA), Turbotax for DOS ($79.95 from Chipsoft Inc. of San Diego), J.K. Lasser's Your Income Tax (or "YIT," as the manual calls it, $74.95 from Simon & Schuster Software of New York City), EasyTax ($79.95 from Timeworks Inc. of Northbrook, Ill.) and Personal Tax Edge ($49 from Parsons Technology Inc. of Hiawatha, Iowa). All are for DOS computers. Windows and Macintosh programs are a little trickier to program, so they will arrive later. Taxcut EZ/A is for people who file the 1040EZ or 1040A forms.

[sengsational]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeWras Tax Edge was the first software I used in the early 90s.

I have two years of "Personal Tax Edge" (which I forgot that I used). Also in that era, I used TurboTax once. Mostly just kept with TaxCut. I usually squirrel away the install CD, but might have tossed the extremely old ones. I've been creating a non-standard directory "TaxCutyy" under "tax" so that when I move computers, it's easy to drag the folder over. Not that I ever go back and look at any of these, but I could if I wanted to. I've been putting a "print to PDF" final version in the folder too, since TaxCut comes with the print to PDF feature (almost worth the $23 bucks itself).

[skipro33]

Received my H&R from Newegg yesterday. Loaded and transferred last year's data over. Since I know my income; pension and SS, was able to populate pretty much everything. I owe an additional $1,007 to the feds on a gross $91K income. They are penalizing me $3 for that.

[Sunset]

I received my mailed H&R Block tax software code , which was purchased from NewEgg.

I'm wondering if others have downloaded and installed it, and felt it was legit.

Reason I'm wondering is because the download site is: https://gethrblock.com/crns
Instead of some hrblock.com subdomain or page.

Then when the actual download starts, it comes from:
https://camry-webapi.azurewebsites.net

I expected the downloads would be from hrblock.com

[jimbee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeWras Just for the fun of it. Remember any of these from 1991? Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/11/12/s...-programs.html

Here is a nice rundown of your income tax software options in 1992.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOZ9...ature=emb_logo

[skipro33]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunset I received my mailed H&R Block tax software code , which was purchased from NewEgg. I'm wondering if others have downloaded and installed it, and felt it was legit. Reason I'm wondering is because the download site is: https://gethrblock.com/crns Instead of some hrblock.com subdomain or page. Then when the actual download starts, it comes from: https://camry-webapi.azurewebsites.net I expected the downloads would be from hrblock.com

I got my code, downloaded and migrated past year information over. Heck, I've even filled it all out, projecting remaining earnings for the year. No problem. It's legit.

[Paulz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunset I received my mailed H&R Block tax software code , which was purchased from NewEgg. I'm wondering if others have downloaded and installed it, and felt it was legit. Reason I'm wondering is because the download site is: https://gethrblock.com/crns Instead of some hrblock.com subdomain or page. Then when the actual download starts, it comes from: https://camry-webapi.azurewebsites.net I expected the downloads would be from hrblock.com

I bought mine directly from HR Block and my URL was:

https://smrtinterface.hrblock.com/do...e-State-DL.exe

[skipro33]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paulz I bought mine directly from HR Block and my URL was: https://smrtinterface.hrblock.com/do...e-State-DL.exe

Your link is broken...

[Paulz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by skipro33 Your link is broken...

Yes it is. I removed some of the information as it would serve no purpose. Point was to show the OP where my link originated from.

[sengsational]

H&R Block plasters a "draft form" message 4 times per page, oftentimes obscuring the values on the form. I wrote a quickie for myself, and figured I'd let the folks here use it (if they trusted me to run code on their machine). All this does is read a PDF and remove any text larger than 16, writing out to a separate file.

You put the HRBlock.pdf in a folder with RemoveBigText.exe, then run it with an output file name:

RemoveBigText HRBlock.pdf HRBlockCleaned.pdf

Quote:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/10yI...ew?usp=sharing

If you code yourself, I'll give you the source code.

ETA: Should I try to get this running on Andriod?
ETA2: It's a few lines of Java that I pretty much lifted as-is from StackOverflow.

[Sunset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paulz I bought mine directly from HR Block and my URL was: https://smrtinterface.hrblock.com/do...e-State-DL.exe

That would not be a worry as : <anything>.hrblock.com/.......

is a subdomain of hrblock.com and cannot be owned by others.

My concern is that the domains where I went to enter my code and then downloaded the software are not part of hrblock.com domain.

[Sunset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paulz Yes it is. I removed some of the information as it would serve no purpose. Point was to show the OP where my link originated from.

Good thing you removed that information, as it included your registration code , which you probably recognized.

I used a hex editor to look at the tiny exe file I downloaded from gethrblock.com
I saw they embeded my registration code and name .. etc..
And they gave the subdomain URL for HrBlock, passing in the information. Probably similar to your link.

So I just copied out the information from the .exe and pasted it into the browser, and downloaded the H&R software.

I'm feeling more comfortable as I got the actual software directly from H&R block.
I installed it and it works

[athena53]

Well, don't rush to buy TurboTax. I downloaded the 2020 version from Costco and it's pretty much useless. I've got an estimated version of 2020 in my 2019 version- at this point nearly everything for 2020 is in or can be estimated and I can input dummy forms with summary dividends, interest, CG distributions, etc.

The 2020 version won't even let me enter SS and pension income. They claim the IRS hasn't finalized forms yet. Not much I can do but wait.