Deductions & credits

KathrynG3 · ‎April 6, 2021

No. The issue is the order of operations.

When getting an entry error for the Cares Act above-the-line deduction, leave it blank or do not otherwise adjust the amount in this box. Any donation must be entered in the regular section first or an error may result. TurboTax is interpreting any value as an override when there is nothing entered in the donations section first. It will calculate this for you.

For taxpayers who are itemizing, run through the interview again to leave the Cares Act Charitable Donation entry blank to clear the error.

To qualify for the Cares Act above-the-line deduction up to $300 for all taxpayers except married filing separate, who would each have a maximum of $150, for standard deduction filers, the IRS clarifies that the contribution must be:

a cash contribution;
made to a qualifying organization;
made during the calendar year 2020

To enter charitable donations in TurboTax Online, follow these steps:

From the left menu, select Federal.
Four tabs will appear across the top of your program. Select the second tab, Deductions & Credits.
Scroll to Charitable Donations and select Start to begin.
Answer Yes to Do you want to enter your donations for 2020?
For each donation, follow these steps:
- Enter who the donation was to at Let's enter your donations one at a time and indicate what type of item was donated, either an Item, Money, Stock, or Mileage and travel expenses
- Follow the prompts from there, and enter the amount of the donation
- When finished, select Done with This Donation.
Select + Add Another Donation if you have additional entries and Continue.
Next, to trigger the extra deduction screen, run through all the deductions and credits and click Wrap Up Tax Breaks again to trigger the Cares Act Charitable Donation screen so that it will automatically calculate. Leave this cell blank. The information entered in the regular area will be calculated and the maximum allowable deduction will be added.

To do this in TurboTax CD/Download, follow these steps:

Go to the PERSONAL tab and select the second button from the left, Deductions & Credits.
Select I'll choose what I work on.
Enter in the charitable donation amount as you normally would in the Charitable Donations section of Deductions & Credits.
When finished entering all donations, select Done with Charitable Donations and Continue.
Scroll to the end of the Deductions & Credits page and select Done with Deductions.
- You may need to respond to any other additional questions. You will eventually see: The Standard Deduction is Right for You!
- Click Continue.
- Now, you will see Charitable Cash Contributions under Cares Act where you will see any qualified contribution amount already entered from your earlier posts. Leave this blank. Select Continue.

Do not enter anything more for the amount. If there is an amount prepopulated here, do not adjust it. Proceed through the rest of the interview.

Run the Review again. This should clear the error.

For more information, see IRS Charitable Contributions Deductions