Unfortunately, it's unclear when this will be fixed. So here's another idea for a workaround. Hopefully someone knowledgeable at Intuit can comment on its efficacy. Does anyone who works on TurboTax actually read this forum, or is this just for us victims, um, I mean, users?
For those of us who have the adjusted cost basis for ESPP sales (either from your broker, or from your company, or maybe you know how to calculate this yourself), you can enter this manually into the forms so that the gain calculation is correct -- and you don't get double-taxed. After importing your 1099-B, you can select each ESPP sale and go through the "I have all my info" interview questions as normal, entering all your information. After you're done, of course, TT won't actually use the adjusted cost basis, which is the issue a lot of us are struggling with.
- Go to View -> Forms, and look for "Capital g/l adj (XXsh XYZ Inc)" that matches your ESPP sale.
- Click on it to open the Capital Gain (Loss) Adjustments Worksheet.
- In Part III Specific Adjustments, check the box for "Form 1099-B reports an incorrect basis (code B)...".
- Enter the adjusted cost basis in the yellow box on that line.
- Repeat for your other ESPP sales.
- Click on Form 8949 and check to see if the gains now look as expected.
- Hit the "Close Form" button at the bottom to get back into Step-by-Step mode.
The total for column (g) (Amount of adjustment) in Form 8949 for your ESPP sales should add up to your ESPP amount in box 14 of your W2 (similar to your cost bases in column (e) for your RSU sales), if your company reports these items.
I'm willing to wait a few more days for a fix, but if we don't hear anything soon, we'll all have to take matters into our own hands and pursue other resolutions. I, for one, feel that manually entering the adjusted cost basis in the underlying worksheets when the normal user interface fails to do this should be a viable workaround, as long as the forms that go to the IRS are correct. But I don't know the inner workings of TT, so I may be missing something.
