Just wanted people to know that I followed the advice of creating a $100k income, going through the form for that, then deleting it, as @KathrynG3 said.
That did work.
I received my refund a few days ago.
However, the fact I had to spend about 10 or more hours on here trying to figure out which of the several workarounds to use, then having to worry about whether it was right or not, is UNACCEPTABLE. Especially since this problem was reported at the end of January and as far as I know they still have not fixed the bug in their online software!
Also who knows if it really worked (I'm not guaranteeing it by any means!) or if some dead head sleepy IRS person just looked at my return and let it go based on how little money I made last year...
I just can't say for sure.
So I will not say "do it the way I did it because it worked".
Instead I will say USE ANOTHER SERVICE , as I will be doing from now on, because it is unacceptable to PAY over $100 for a service that doesn't work the way it's supposed to and have to spend YOUR TIME AND ENERGY figuring out how to "mickey mouse" or "workaround" the problem and then worry over whether or not it will be accepted and "passed" or not!
The only way I'll come back to TT is if they find this thread and offer me a free return next year. (I know they won't but they really should. ) Even if it were FREE, it's not worth the pain and suffering of having the software not work right.
