"Military Retirement and Civil Service Pension Income" for Ohio does not give credit for yrs of Military Service. SOFTWARE ERROR and do not charge me for EXPERT HELP

[greenda]

How do you get this fixed without getting charged for "Get Expert Help" ?

[DaveF1006]

To get the deduction without paying for "Expert Help," you need to navigate to a specific screen in the Ohio state interview that most people skip:

1. Go to the "State Taxes" tab and start (or revisit) your Ohio return.
2. Look for a screen titled "Here's the income that Ohio handles differently" or "A few things before we wrap up your state return."
3. Find the line for "Military and Civil Service Retirement Income" and click Start or Edit.
4. You will likely see your Civil Service pension listed. TurboTax will ask: "Was any of this retirement pay based on military service?"
5. Select Yes. 6. You will then be prompted to enter the taxable amount attributable to military service.

If you are asked to put a dollar amount in this section, use this formula to determine an amount:

Total Pension X (military years/total federal years)

[greenda · Accepted solution]

The TurboTax formula is wrong!  Playing around with the formula, the more Military Time I add, the less my Return Money is.  I should get credit for the military time, NOT PAY MORE.  My phone number is [phone number removed] if you want me to clarify.   

[greenda]

You do not understand my point. I have no military retirement. I have Fed Civil Service Retirement. Ohio asks how many years of military service I have to REDUCE my Fed Civil Service Retirement. ( I have do this for 11 Years), Test it yourself, I get more back when I have Zero military service.  We could solve this with a phone call. [phone number removed]

[BillM223]

The formula that TurboTax uses, which is described on page 24 of the Ohio IT-1040 instructions, is to make a ratio of the number of years of military service divided by (the number of years of military service plus the number of years of civilian employment with the US government) and multiple this ratio times the federal civil service pension attributable to military service. This gives a deduction that is subtracted from Ohio taxable income on line 2b on the IT-1040.

In the example given in the Ohio IT-1040 booklet (link above), the amount of pension in line 1 of the IT-1040 was $90,000, the number of years of military service was 10 years and the number of years of civilian employment within the US government was 20 years. This gives us 90,000 times (10/(10+20)), or 90,000 times 1/3, or 30,000 for the federal civil service pension deduction.

In the step-by-step interview for Ohio, on the screen with the title "Military Retirement and Civil Service Pension Income", you would enter zero for the military retirement income, 90,000 for the federal civil service pension income, 10 years in the military, and 20 years for the time in the US government.

Given the formula above, the deduction is smaller when the years of military service is smaller, so your Ohio taxable income increases along with your tax.

I do not see how "I get more back when I have Zero military service". If the number of years of military service goes to zero, as you say, then the Uniformed Services Retirement Income on line 34 on the Ohio Schedule of Adjustments goes to zero, so the deductions against Ohio income are smaller.

Perhaps if you would tell us what your numbers are above, so that we can see what you are talking about. Note that we in the Community cannot call you.