I've been beating my head against the wall trying to understand this and think the problem may be a whole lot simpler (and dumber) than people think. I've now checked both Turbotax, TaxAct, and a few other sources. If you read the PA-40 Instructions for PA 40 Line 5, there is a clear statement that you must "fill in the Oval" if the number is on Line 5 is negative. Could it be THAT simple? Form PA 40 on the PA Revenue website has the "oval" it clear as day. I have yet to see any web preparer have that oval in their produced state eform. I lost out on a $9K loss last year because of this and am really struggling to get anyone to own up to it. I mean, it puts the right number in the form, but there must be something on the PA processing side that isn't smart enough to see it's a negative number. That's my hunch anyway. I just sent email into PA support so will post again if I get a response.
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