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Submission + - Intuit reverses course. Turbo tax 2014 Deluxe support schedule D

140Mandak262Jamuna writes: Intuit quietly removed support for schedule D and C from Turbo Tax 2014, forcing people to upgrade to Premier version. It created a huge backlash from the customers. Slashdot covered it on Jan 12. There were a lot of media coverage too. Some VP was posting in the amazon reviews trying to spin the news. Suggesting things like it is still possible to file Schedule D in the "forms" mode. [ Forms mode just saves a trip to the post office or to irs.gov to download the forms. That is all, it is print it out, fill it up and mail it in option. ]

Eventually Intuit has reversed course and is posting in Amazon.com reviews, that it is going to refund the money to people who were forced to upgrade, and add the feature back to Deluxe version and promises never to do it again.

TurboTax Desktop Customers:

We recently communicated to you about the changes we made to TurboTax desktop software products. The message back to me was clear — you want your TurboTax desktop product to do what it always has done — handle the same tax situations as it did in years past. We've heard you and here's what we going to do.

1. Beginning February 7, returning Deluxe desktop customers who need to upgrade can do so within the product for free, making it simple and seamless.

2. For returning customers who have already upgraded to Premier or Home & Business, we are continuing to offer $25 cash back through April 20. Just go to www.TurboTax.com/25back where we've streamlined the process.

3. Next year, we're changing back to the TurboTax desktop software you know and love by restoring the forms that you've counted on for years (and for some of you, decades).

We will be communicating this to customers in the coming days.

I realize this hasn't been easy on you, and I'm sorry for that. I also recognize that it took us too long to make this right. We are committed to earning your trust again.

Bob Meighan, VP, TurboTax

Comment Re:Double Irish (Score 4, Interesting) 825

Because corporations shield the shareholders from liability. It costs nothing to create a corporation. It costs nothing to create a series of corporations one owning other. It is easy to funnel all the assets, income one way and stop the liabilities from flowing along with the assets and income. Thus the tail end corporation will have all the liabilities without any asset to pay for. Corporations don't go to jail. We must tax the corporation for getting this special privilege of being able to do business without anyone having to go to jail.

When limited liability corporations were first proposed, the biggest opposition was due to, "If the corporation commits murder who goes to jail?". Corporations must be taxed, and then the dividends paid to the shareholders must be taxed again, and when the dividends are spent we will assess them sales taxes again, if the post-tax dividend is used to buy a home, we will tax the home year after year.

We have coddled the tax evaders and their apologists for far too long. Government can tax anything for any reason. We will use it to the fullest extent. Don't like it, go somewhere like Somalia and conduct your business. Good riddance.

Comment Two potential markets. (Score 1, Informative) 458

1. Automobile sharing like, iUber. 95% of the cars bought remain unused 95% of the time. [*FN1] Cars are the second most expensive thing a typical American buys. The most expensive for renters. The first expensive thing for all too. This level of over investment in something that lies idle for so long, depreciates in value.. It is ready for a huge disruption. Uber and its clones are the first movers. A company with better image would do a lot better.

2. More than 70% of credit transactions are not loans, the balance gets paid every month. Credit card companies are raking in 2% commission on these sales without taking the risk of advancing an unsecured loan. Most retailers are not giving 2% discount to non-credit cards because of contract with credit card companies. Only when the non-credit card usage reaches a critical mass, they will flip and customers and retailers will split that 2% off the credit card companies and banks. Waiting for a company with credibility for mass market adoption.

[*FN1] 100 *( 1 - (15000 miles/year) / (55 miles/hour) / ((365 days/year) *(24 hours/day)) )

Comment Will it have the preview pane? (Score 4, Interesting) 175

Will it have a preview pane that will execute all the macros in the email, fetch all the attachments and render them on screen on just a mouse over the subject line? Will it also disobey the native sandboxes in android and introduce "internet zone" "safe zone" "home zone" "vpn zone" "super trustworthy microsoft zone" etc? Great! Just what the world has been waiting for.

Comment Re:Competition is good (Score 1) 280

Embrace, Extend and Extinguish worked only because it had the monopoly on the OS to destroy competing office suites, then it had office-windows monopoly to extinguish everyone else in the desktop market.

It will try to do what it did in gaming market. Use the cash cows of office and windows to subsidize a division and engage in a war of attrition. But it did not work out in many arenas. Like Quicken used its market dominance in TurboTax to fight off Microsoft Money. Microsoft tried to pay people to use Bing, even that did not succeed.

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