I received a lump sum from social security disability in 2017 for 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. do i have to claim all of it on my 2017 taxes or can i redo my prior years ?

[LinaJ2018 · Accepted solution]

No, you do not need to claim it all on your 2017 taxes. IRS has a special way of re-calculating your prior taxes on your current tax return without the need to amend your prior years' tax returns.  On your 2017 taxes, you might need to pay taxes on a small portion of your lump-sum payment. However, you may avoid paying higher taxes on your 2017 tax return by apportioning prior year benefits to those previous years’ income.  In TurboTax program, please follow on-screen prompts to enter your information and the software will recalculate your prior years' taxes and apply to your 2017 tax return.

In TurboTax online edition, here are the steps:

1.  After sign into your account, select Take me to my return

2.  At the right upper corner, in the box, type in social security benefit 

3.  Jump to social security benefits

4. Follow prompts to enter your information.  Please also see attached information below to complete your entries. 

https://ttlc.intuit.com/replies/4767454