TurboTax Deluxe 2004 Win/Mac

Rating:
Summary: No problems whatsoever...
Review: I bought this product and was able to file my taxes, without incident, in a timely manner. I was really glad that I was not persuaded by the horrible experiences other people seemed to have with this product. My husband and I were able to file all of our taxes in two hours without having to leave the comforts of our living room. Turbo Tax Deluxe prompted us and walked us through all pertinent information. We answered the questions accordingly, printed out our taxes, and have filed by mail -- well before April 15th. Seriously, folks, if you can insert a cd-rom into your hard drive, you can use this software...we had absolutely no problems.

Rating:
Summary: Easy to install and use on a Macintosh
Review: I have an older Mac with OS 9.2. I had no problem to install and use both the Federal and State programs. The CD was also much easier to obtain this year, since it was included with the PC version. Last year I was on the phone daily with problems downloading the program. The employees of the Indian call center were all intelligent, polite and determined to resolve my problem. I ended up with a refund AND the program. I would much rather speak with them than with the clueless Americans some firms hire. After a few shakey years, I am once again a loyal customer

Rating:
Summary: No support for Stock Option / Plan Transactions
Review: I have been using TurboTax for 5 years and it has always supported all types of employee stock plan transactions in the interview. Now, apparently we are forced to buy Premier if we want to have the same functionality.

Rating:
Summary: Do NOT buy this product if you are a mac user!!
Review: I just wanted to reiterate that this software absolutely does not work on macs. Not only that, but if you want customer service from Turbotax, they charge $9.95 for each customer service call. Go with Taxcut!

Rating:
Summary: Easy as 1,2,3
Review: I'm glad I did not read all the confusion before I bouht Turbo Tax. I just on a whim decided to go with it and I was sick of paying a service $200 plus to file. I found the program to be easy to install, easy to jump screen to screen, easy to play around and figure out what works best for YOU in the end. I loved it, best investment. Easy as 1,2,3!

Rating:
Summary: Don't do it!! Boycot this product
Review: I've been a customer of Turbotax from the very beginning. This year has been my first bad experience. And it's incredibly bad.

I did not order this through Amazon, so please don't associate this bad review with Amazon, the company.

I ordered Turbotax Deluxe directly from the company on Jan. 7, 2005. I received confirmation of shipment on Jan. 13, 2005. Two weeks later I still had not received my product. I looked at my credit card statement and it had been charged already.

I tried calling support and it was obvious that the support center had been outsourced to India. The people are nice enough. But they are just not given enough authority to do ANYTHING USEFUL!

The first support call ended with a hangup after waiting for about 30 minutes. I did talk to someone. But they couldn't find any evidence of my order. I called again the next day. This time they said that the computers were down and there was no way that they could track my order.

A few days later (Jan. 26), after my temper had subsided, I called again. They found my order information. The lady said that she would put in a new order for me and gave me a new order number. She said it would be shipped Next Day UPS. I asked for a tracking number and couldn't get one because she said the order needed to be processed.

On Jan. 31 I had not yet received my order. So I called again. They said that the order had not been processed yet. I asked if they could expedite it. They couldn't give me an answer. I asked if they could tell me when it would be processed. They said I should receive the product soon. I asked what 'SOON' meant. The said a few days.

You can see where this is going. It's now Feb. 3 and I can tell by looking at their online support that the order has not been processed yet.

I'm having a hard time giving money to a company that helps me pay my U.S. income taxes and has support that is farmed out to a cheap labor Indian firm that has no way of helping me.

CHOOSE A DIFFERENT PRODUCT!

Rating:
Summary: Proceed with Caution--problems with updates installation
Review: I've used TT for eight years with no glitches but now am one of those caught up in the update installation debacle. My TT 2004 Deluxe installed successfully in Dec (OS is Win 98SE) and went through one flawless update cycle to include getting my state forms but the second update releases (mid Jan)have caused major problems which Intuit appears slow to cure. While I found customer service responsive via email (within 12 hrs) their fix did not work for me and a reply to the msg got me a response of "this is an unmonitored mailbox". A tour of their website's user fora suggests the problem is widespread with a small number of users able to work their own fix by editing their registry and deleting all traces of the program/update files and going through multiple uninstall/reinstalls, defraging their hard drives, etc.. I use the program in part because of the ease in carrying over the previous year's tax data. If you haven't bought the program yet and can hold off on filing, I'd contact Intuit to ensure that a corrected version is available on CD and then act. Or, try a different tax preparation program.

Rating:
Summary: No Problems At All
Review: Improved over '03 version. Very ergo friendly. I've been using TT since 1996 and I can say the '04 version is the best interface yet. The changes are subtle but much appreciated. I think Intuit has been listening to their focus groups. It has the best presentation of taking you through tax questions I have seen yet. Like anyone preparing their taxes, I end up going back and forth many times and the 2004 version allows me to find inputted data quickly and make changes as necessary. Previous versions have been good in this way but this one's even better. I'm sorry to hear of install problems by so many. My OS is WinXPPro'05. My installation and tax return preparation has been flawless including importing my '03 return and the free state download. I almost didn't buy the '04 because of problems with TT'03 but I'm really glad I did. My '03 version would not import my '02 return and I would input info and discover later that it didn't save. I spent many extra hours working with it last year.
If you purchase, I recommend 1) If you have no use for "It's Deductible," use your OS's Add/Remove to get rid of it. 2) Save your completed return as a pdf file as well as the usual TT tax file. (Select "File" menu, then "Save to PDF...") It's a good backup in case importing the following year doesn't work and I can access any year's return in pdf without having to load that year's TT. 3) Be sure to use the enclosed rebate if you efile.

Rating:
Summary: Taxes started and done in just a couple of hours.
Review: This is the first year that I've been able to just sit down and handle my taxes in one fell swoop. I'm just an average taxpayer with an average WinXP machine, so it's not like I was taxing the software, but this is the first year that I've not spent a couple of anxious nights cussing it out waiting on either additional paperwork or the state edition to be available for download or something like that. So I'm a happy and reduced-stress customer this year and will be back for more next year.

Rating:
Summary: Worked nicely on a Mac
Review: TurboTax Deluxe 2004 worked easily for me. I did my taxes on a Mac (OS X, Jaguar 10.2.8) following the whole process -- 1) installed software on computer, 2) downloaded updates and free state download, 3) prepared fed and state tax forms, and lastly 4) e-filed the completed returns. All went smoothly without a hitch. I subscribe to the automatic renewal plan. I prefer this method rather than having to go buy the boxes of software and clip out the proof of purchases for rebates each year. Thus, each year around Christmas time, I get the annual Turbotax CD by postal mail. Then when it is superbowl time, I remember to bring out the CD and do my taxes. I like to keep the process simple.