SOFTWARE GLITCH - Accumulated Amortization of Intangible Asset shows up as Charitable Contribution

[RobertQ]

I am using TurboTax Business.  I have an intangible asset that is partially amortized every year.  I enter the beginnning of year amortization amount in the step by step for the balance sheet and Turbotax takes the number and it shows up as a charitable contribution in the same amount on the income statement. 

I called and explained the issue and walked the customer service guy through to demonstrate the error.  He got it and reported it to tech.  I received a confirmation and then the following email.  

We appreciate your patience while we looked into your issue, and for providing a diagnostic copy of your tax return. After reviewing the submitted tax file and investigating the issue, we found that your return contains a Schedule L Balance Sheet which is not supported by TurboTax. Due to the complexity of your return, you may wish to seek the assistance of an outside tax professional.

I called back since I believe this is an obvious software glitch and the subject tax return is not complex.  To demonstrate that this is a software glitch I opened a new return, went to the balance sheet step by step to input a starting accumulated amortization number.  This was the only number in the return.  I then went to the step by step deductions tab and the same number shows up as a charitable contribution. 

Please help.  I cannot believe it is this hard to get tech to understand the issue. 

[Anonymous]

It may well be a glitch but what the email is telling you is that because TurboTax doesn't support Schedule L balance sheets on 1120-S forms, which is where Accumulated Amortization is reported, they aren't going to look into it.  

Accumulated Amortization actually is complex, and not something that many TurboTax users will have, so they're not going to address it, that's the bottom line it sounds like, unfortunately. 

[RobertQ]

I understand the answer that I received and I am not looking for support about accumulated amortization.  I am looking for the program's step by step balance sheet walk through to link to the correct place in the tax returns.  If they don't support Schedule L that is up to them, but building a program with an obvious glitch is bad business.   The answer is unacceptable.  I'm not looking for support.  I am asking the software engineering team to correct their mistake.  

[Anonymous]

Your point is completely valid but I think they are saying since they don't support that FORM, they're not going to fix it.  Which isn't good - but it seems like they have their hands full this year, and honestly you may be the only customer with the issue.  I agree, it's not an ideal situation, but I think that's what they're saying - that they're not going to take the time to fix it since they don't support the form at all.  When they don't support a form it's "use at your own risk".    They already don't support any "taxy" stuff in business, just entry support - they really aren't a company designed for this type of return so they give it a half effort, and that's what you are seeing here, I think. 

Can you override the form in "forms mode" of the software and move the number to the right place?  just a thought 

[jlw0003]

Well, annajoe803,

Your responses are probably correct; in fact, I find that Intuit doesn't support much of anything in TurboTax Business. I have been using this program for a few years now for different types of businesses and am continually disappointed with the quality of the interview and integration with the forms. It is pretty clear that they do the bare minimum to provide an interview, geared only to the smallest businesses.

In any event, here it is in February 2022, using the 2021 Business product for a very simple LLC filing as a partnership. And, of course, the same thing happened. Beginning Intangible amortization shows up as a Charitable contribution. And the only way to eliminate it is deleted it from the form. Intangible amortization is not complicated and the Asset Entry form handles it fine and puts it on the correct line on the income statement, but not the Balance Sheet. There is no excuse for putting an amount entered on the balance sheet in a totally unrelated Schedule K item. Just sloppy programing, full stop. Not about support. Would take about 30 seconds to fix the program code.

But you are correct about lack of support for Schedule L. Very few small businesses use it and it is not required. But if Intuit is not going to support simple entries on it they should say so up front and save us a lot of time trying to figure it out. Even take it out of the interview process and direct users to go straight to the form.

In any event, my advice to all preparing Business returns: FORGET THE INTERVIEW! Just go straight to the forms. And if you do use the interview, be sure to closely examine every item on every form before filing. There are many items on the forms not covered or buried in the interview that may be overlooked.