How do I fix my charitable contributions? It says I have an unacceptable value.

[eieio1]

After doing the federal check and it finally saying no errors, I did the state taxes and when I did their review, it amounts were changed back to the original incorrect federal amounts.

[Income Tax Sappy]

Yep.  You have to go back in again and set it at $600 in order to get through the state taxes. 😖

[jjm7]

The reply from jayb123 worked for me.  Thanks so much for your input!  Perhaps we TurbTax owes you a "piece of the action" for submitting a fix that they could not handle themselves.  Will definitely think twice before using the software again next year.

[Unbelievable2022]

No, that doesn’t work. And for married filling jointly it should accept $600.

[Tommy31]

After the update came out at the end of January I put my charitable contributions back in. Then I deleted the older entry and then the program was able to correct it. I submitted it successfully today.

[Jane2065]

I am getting the unacceptable value error too. Everyone is talking about the $300. However, the IRS website says that "individuals who do not itemize, including married individuals filing separate returns, can claim a deduction of up to $300 for cash contributions made to qualifying charities during 2021. The maximum deduction is increased to $600 for married individuals filing joint return."

Is this also going to be corrected, since TurboTax will not allow the $600 value? 

[howardsherer]

Spent hours on my own and with TT tech support. Nothing worked until I found this post. Thanks, DoninGA

[pcarlson9]

Waiting for TT to get this corrected is going to delay you getting your taxes submitted. Read this thread from the beginning and look for solutions that worked for others. I used DoninGA's solution and it worked for me.

[vmortimer]

Mine is changing from 600 to 300

[AnnetteB6]

For the 2021 tax return using the Married Filing Joint filing status, you are allowed to deduct up to $600 in cash contributions to charity without claiming itemized deductions.

If you are using the Married Filing Joint filing status AND using the standard deduction:

As you go through your Federal return and you have entered your charitable contributions, you will not see any additional questions regarding your inputs.  If your state return also allows you to deduct charitable contributions, then the amounts you entered will be taken into account on your state return. 

After you have finished your state return and you are getting ready to file, when you run the final Review, you will probably see this message:

1040/1040SR Wks:  Charitable Contributions:  Charitable contributions has an unacceptable value

You will also see a place at the top of the screen for Charitable contributions with '300' in the box.  Below that box, you can see your Form 1040 line 12a which shows the amount of your cash contributions that you already entered. 

If your line 12a is greater or equal to $600, enter '600' in the box at the top of the screen.

If your line 12a is less than $600, enter your line 12a amount in the box at the top of the screen.

After changing the input at the top of the screen to the correct value, proceed through any other errors that may pop up and then move forward to file your return.  It is very important that you do not revisit any other section of your return before you file or the change may not be retained or able to be changed a second time.

See the screenshot below for reference:

@vmortimer

[LisaZ3]

None of the TT tax advisors solutions worked for me. DoninGA on page 6 recommended the thing that worked for me--go to the Forms tab on the top of the software page, and go into the form that has the error, put in the correct amount ($300 or $600 or whatever your charitable donations total up to $600 for standardized deduction folks) there. Finally!

[elgarcia]

I have entered all of my charitable deductions individually, but chose to take the standard deduction overall. Now, even though my form has 300.00 entered, it still says that I have an unacceptable value. I have done the workarounds noted previously. Apparently this error has not been fixed as was noted in a January posting.

[AnnetteB6]

For the 2021 tax return using the Married Filing Joint filing status, you are allowed to deduct up to $600 in cash contributions to charity without claiming itemized deductions.

If you are using the Married Filing Joint filing status AND using the standard deduction:

As you go through your Federal return and you have entered your charitable contributions, you will not see any additional questions regarding your inputs.  If your state return also allows you to deduct charitable contributions, then the amounts you entered will be taken into account on your state return. 

After you have finished your state return and you are getting ready to file, when you run the final Review, you will probably see this message:

1040/1040SR Wks:  Charitable Contributions:  Charitable contributions has an unacceptable value

You will also see a place at the top of the screen for Charitable contributions with '300' in the box.  Below that box, you can see your Form 1040 line 12a which shows the amount of your cash contributions that you already entered. 

If your line 12a is greater or equal to $600, enter '600' in the box at the top of the screen.

If your line 12a is less than $600, enter your line 12a amount in the box at the top of the screen.

After changing the input at the top of the screen to the correct value, proceed through any other errors that may pop up and then move forward to file your return.  It is very important that you do not revisit any other section of your return before you file or the change may not be retained or able to be changed a second time.

See the screenshot below for reference:

@elgarcia

[ckraeme]

Try entering "$600"

this is the only amount that actually worked for me, I was FINALLY able to get my return to E-File instead of mail only option

I think this is because I'm married filing jointly and the amount you can use here is $600 (max) but the field was auto populating with $300 for some reason (I definitely had more than $600 in contributions anyway)

[pansy]

It works except that I'm filing a Standard deduction and it removed about $400 from my refund? This problem is ridiculous!