Rating: 
Summary: The Customer IS the QA Department!
Review: I've been a satisfied Taxcut Deluxe user for my 1998, 1999, and 2000 returns. Not this year. I've no problems with the interface, and now that I've read a couple of reviews, I'll probably go back and see if the errors that were pointed out (i.e. Roth IRA contribution deduction) were really there.My beef is the stablity of the updated releases, which are forced upon you when you install the State editions. After the update, doing a "Final Check" would crash at and after the "2001 Tax Rebate" screen. I've confirmed this from an imported return as well as entering a *blank* return with no data and stepping through all the screens. My initial phone call with tech support was acceptable--we did the usual uninstall / reinstall, re-saving the return, making sure I had Admin rights on my machine, and running it in Win2K Safe Mode. The problem persisted, and he said he was going to escalate this to engineering. I received a message from another tech support person (the escalation guy?) about 2 days later, who called to troubleshoot this problem with me. I called back a day later, and was greeted by yet another tech support person, who did not take the time to read through my problem log (CRM evidently can't overcome ineptitude), and took it upon himself to try to solve the problem with me. Here's a good solution: update to IE6, since I'm still on IE5, and see if the problem goes away. I humored him, but the problem persisted, so he promised a follow up in 2 days. I'm still waiting. I'll try giving them a call again tomorrow, just to waste some Long Distance money. For the positive reviews, I'd suspect the reviewers have either simple tax situations, are running Win9x / NT4, or both. From the negative reviews, Win2K and winMe seem to affect Taxcut's stability. Unfortunately, I have neither time nor patience to reinstall Win9x / NT4 just to do my taxes, and frankly, I (and potential buyers) should NOT be H&R Block's QA department. Being an unemployed former dot-commer, however, I am available for hire :-)
Rating: 
Summary: Next Year I switch to TurboTax
Review: I've been using Taxcut for 4 years and with the exeption of an online-version fiasco a couple of years ago I've been pretty happy. This year the software was buggy, the UI was misaligned and difficult, and the printouts (supporting docs, not the Actual forms) were terrible. (On a Win2k system) Add to that the fact that with the deluxe version you still have to shell out another $(...) to get your state program and Efile (...) and then try and get $(...) back from 2 seperate rebates and it's just NOT WORTH IT. Avoid it.
Rating: 
Summary: TaxCut is Tops
Review: I've been using TaxCut since 1996 and have always found it to be a superior product. 2001 Filing Edition has been as good as always. Read the reviews on ZDNet and PCMagazine, TaxCut does a better and more accurate job. The TaxCut interview interface is simple and easy to understand. It covers everything from your basic Schedule A itemizations to complex multi-business, investment loss, and capital gains filings. Taxcut has never let me down.
Rating:
Summary: Switching to TurboTax next year
Review: I've used TaxCut for years with no problems, but this year's version is full of bugs. Is there anything more annoying than doing your taxes the last minute and having your tax software repeatedly crash? I've downloaded the latest updates, and it's still unstable.
Rating:
Summary: Switching to TurboTax next year
Review: I've used TaxCut for years with no problems, but this year's version is full of bugs. Is there anything more annoying than doing your taxes the last minute and having your tax software repeatedly crash? I've downloaded the latest updates, and it's still unstable.
Rating:
Summary: Bad Software, buy TurboTax
Review: I've used TurboTax for several years, but this year I bought TaxCut because of the free MS Money offer. This software is designed to drive you in the arms of an HR Block store. I had to manually go to the child care expenses worksheet, because it never asked during the interview. When you search help and click on 'child care credit', you get the help for 'child care expenses'. THESE ARE DIFFERENT! Anyway, there is a couple of more errors or potential pitfalls I ran into after using the software for only two hours, now I have to figure out which ones I might have missed.
Rating:
Summary: TaxCut Beats TurboTax
Review: If you don't belive my previous post that this is the better tax software, cehck out PC Magazine's review in their Jan. 29, 2002 issue. TaxCut beats all contenders and gets 5 stars from them.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointed
Review: Last year we used this program to do taxes and it was fine. It was a little quirky on some of the input and we really didn't use a lot of the features. Our greatest disappointment was with their rebates. We followed all the instructions completely, including mailing the original receipts, and we NEVER got any rebate money back. Soooo, if you are buying this with the intent of saving money in the long run on rebates, don't bother. They aren't very good at getting you the money they say they will.
Rating:
Summary: Unforgiving and a little buggy
Review: My tax situation is very simple. I could easily do my taxes by hand, but since the software is cheap and I prefer eFile, I thought I'd give TaxCut a try. I haven't been too happy. First, I had problem w/ crashes. Crashing actually wasn't too bad as I didn't lose any work. When it came time to eFile, it refused to send. Contacting technical support was little help. They are very slow getting back to you and don't seem to know how to fix anything. Well, instead of messing w/ tech support, I emailed my saved file to work and installed it there. The eFile went through, but I accidently had the file set to read-only. When I quit the program, it asked if I wanted to save. I click on Yes, get an error and the program closes. No save. Now when I go back into the program, it does not know about my eFile and won't let me check the status. As far as I can see there is nothing I can do about since the interface won't let you move to steps if it thinks you don't belong there. Now I'm going to have to run the gauntlet of tech support again. *sigh* I think I'll try a new product next year.
Rating:
Summary: Don't Bother
Review: My taxes are pretty simple this year. I am buying my first house, and I wanted to used some software to a get a feeling for how that might change my tax situtation. I debated between TurboTax and this product. I can't remember why I chose this product. It is a poorly programmed product with a lot of fluff features that are not very helpful. It does not really make filing one's taxes any easier than reading the materials that come with your tax form. The interface, like many others in this product year, has followed the model of imitating the look and feel of a web page. Few controls, wizard based, non-intuitive, amd lots of screen space devoted to images, icons, and graphics. And a reduction in user control. The interface suffers from burying function inside of wizards rather than putting them at your fingertips. It is slow, clumsy, and poorly organized. The program content is heavily loaded with multimedia snippets of basic tax information. This ranges from some somewhat informative information from sources such as Kiplinger's to video of H&R Block personnel talking about VERY basic tax concepts. The kind of stuff one has already heard on the evening news. None of it specific enough to apply to an individual case. The interview style interface for the tax preparation wizard is very poor. Terms are not defined. Nor is it made clear what the implications of user choices may be. I believe one would be better off with editable .pdf versions of the IRS forms. The automatic update features are clumsy and unreliable. When I was conducting my first update, the program crashed and corrupted the existing software. I had to uninstall and reinstall. I haven't used Quicken products but I cannot recommend TaxCut.
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