Thanks for taking the time to reply and for making the fix so simple. I hope I can depend on your advice. I have searched far and wide in the Turbo Tax community for such a simple answer; yours is the first. I spoke with a nice enough gentleman, a "tax expert" from Turbo Tax last night. He initially insisted that earnings from 529 plans were taxable. When I pointed out the non-taxable nature of earnings was the very genesis of the program and why it is so attractive to parents of future college students, then shared documentation to that effect, we moved on to why the program was not handling them properly. He's going to get back to me today.
I don't intend to understate the complexity of putting such a product on the market, but an effective "fix" for this particular problem hardly seems that difficult. It seems computational at it's core and yet I can't imagine how many people this might affect. It resulted in almost a $2000 difference in taxes owed for my family.
I have used Turbo Tax for as long as it's been available. Traditionally the product has been very reliable. Just enter the forms you are sent by your employer, institutions and the government, answer a few questions and you have simplified a very challenging annual rite. I have never encountered a problem like this and while your statements about these specific tax forms being "informational documents" may be accurate, for those of us who are not tax experts (those who might purchase this product and use it to complete what is a very tedious and frustrating endeavor), rely on it's accuracy and simplicity in accomplishing that task. Imagine if someone at Turbo Tax said, "If these two forms, as they've been sent to you by the institutions you trust, are possibly causing your tax bill to be higher because of the way your tax software program is handling them, simply ignore them, throw them away and delete them from the program." Since nobody from Turbo Tax said that, without someone like yourself being the Good Samaritan, we are left to come to that conclusion on our own. Given the serious nature of a failure to complete one's taxes accurately, can you imagine how reckless applying that tactic to solving your tax software problems might be?
Thanks again and happy tax day!
