Charitable contributions error

[Valkwoman]

HELP! I was in the process of filing and got a last minute error "Charitable contributions has an unacceptable value". I am MFJ, both over 65. I tried to paste a print screen of the error but it wont take. TT entered nothing in line 10a and entered $2,500 in line 10b. I cannot change the entries without deleting my 3 cash donations. If I do that my Federal tax increases by $1,000. I have gone back to the forms and the interview and cannot figure out how to make this right.

[DaveF1006]

It depends. Take out the $2500 in line 10B because your cash donations should already show up as charitable deductions in Schedule A. The amount on line 10B is for anyone taking the standard deduction in lieu of the itemized deductions. The amount on 10B should be <$300. Since you are itemizing, that amount on 10B should be 0 or blank.

[Valkwoman]

I followed your step by step instructions to delete the cash donation forms and recreate them. That worked. HOWEVER, my Federal taxes increased by more than $1,500 and my State refund decreased by about $250. This was all due to a coding error in TT. Not happy.

[JamesG1]

You want to itemize your deductions and not take the standard deduction with the Charitable Cash Contribution under CARES Act.  Is that correct? 

Now that you have removed the charitable contributions, are you able to access the screen Charitable Cash Contributions under CARES Act? 

In TurboTax Online, it appears as the end of Deductions & Credits. First you have to pass the screen Based on what you told us, the standard deduction is best for you at the end of Deductions & Credits.

But you have to qualify for the standard deduction before the screen appears.

Follow these steps:

• At the top of the screen, click on Deductions & Credits.
• Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Wrap up tax breaks.
• Continue through several screens.
• At the screen Based on what you told us, the standard deduction is best for you, click Continue.
• At the screen Any Charitable Cash Contributions? delete the dollar amount.
• Continue through Federal Review to make sure that things look correct.

After you have passed Review, are you now able to add back the charitable contributions?  I have seen instances where the Charitable Cash Contribution under CARES Act again re-appears after the screen Based on what you told us, the standard deduction is best for you.

But now at the screen Charitable Cash Contributions under CARES Act, you are able to again delete the dollar amount and pass Review.

[char1935]

I checked the box for itemized deduction by mistake.  I want standard deduction but my e-mail return was rejected (031) and I cannot make a correction because I e-mailed.  How can I get help ?

[char1935]

I cannot remove the check  from the box because I e-mailed my return.  

[MarilynG1]

If you Efiled your return, and it was Rejected by the IRS, you can change from Itemized Deductions to Standard Deduction and Efile again. 

When you open TurboTax, click on 'Fix My Return'.  Reject Code 031 means your AGI or PIN that you entered in the Efile process was not correct.

Click this link for more info on Reject Code 031.

Click this link for info on How to Switch from Standard to Itemized Deductions (or vice versa). 

[eric333]

@Cynthiad66I believe my situation is common to most users encountering this issue, which I'll just spell out for clarity -- I am taking the Standard Deduction. Then I try to put $300 on the "Charitable Cash Contributions under Cares Act" page. Then, when I get to review my federal return, it says there is a problem -- "Cash Charitable is too large". It displays a form. Line 10a has two boxes -- one on the upper right and one on the lower left. The upper right box is empty and is not modifiable in my UI, the lower left box is modifiable and has the 300 value, which is apparently problematic. Line 10b also has 300 in it, and is also apparently problematic. Although, according to conversations in this thread, and also according to TurboTax's software, these numbers should not be problematic.

Is this issue something that will be resolved by the tax deadline of May 17? If I zero these values out, my federal refund decreases, so I would lose money. It seems this is an issue with TurboTax, not the customers' fault -- TurboTax tells us we can claim something, but then it errors out. If we are forced to zero these values out before filing, will TurboTax reimburse us for lost refund values, given it seems to be their issue?

In short, what course of action should we take, given this is an issue that TurboTax has been working on for at least 3 weeks (according to your message).

Thanks

[Cynthiad66]

You should wait for the update.  TurboTax is waiting for the IRS to finalize these forms so that we can update our software.  We cannot just go in and make changes to TurboTax because the IRSS and TurboTax systems must communicate accurately for processing returns.

Yes your problem is quite common right now.  There will be solutions to all of the  remaining issues or the season will most likely extend again.  IRS had to suspend some processing activities because of issuing Stimulus payments.

[eric333]

Thank you, @Cynthiad66, for the quick response!

My only remaining question is if you know of any way for users encountering this issue to be notified of the update, other than repeatedly trying to see if it works. Is there a page that lists updates made, or a way to get notified via email? Or can we expect to be notified on this thread? etc.

Thank you 🙂

[DaveF1006]

As of now, we unfortunately don't have a timetable for the update. 

[jl206]

My itemized deduction is 24,955, which includes charitable contribution of $2,400. Standard deduction is 24,800. Because IRS allows for up to $300 deduction for charitable contribution on top of the $24,800, it makes sense for me to use standard deduction and put $300 in line 10b. TurboTax doesn't how to do that yet..according to the post, they are working on an update. So I went into the forms and manually change both boxes in 10b to $300. For some odd reason, it already used standard deduction amount in 1040 form and I didn't have to change that. After that, there's no more errors reported by the software. I hope that is an ok change and it won't have issues when I e-file my taxes. Has anyone else tried that?

[eric333]

We are now only two business days away from the May 17 deadline, and the issue persists. Are there any status updates on this? Thanks

[DaveF1006]

It depends. Are you itemizing or taking the standard deduction? If itemizing, the amount should be zero but if you are taking a standard deduction, you should put $25 into that section.

[eric333]

Thank you @DaveF1006 for the quick response!

My full story is a few comments, above, here. But the short version is that I'm taking the standard deduction. So, just to clarify, the $300 charitable contributions deduction has been finalized with the IRS to max out at $25, instead, and will not change from there?

Thanks