Lawsuit Awards

[user17728962802]

As a successful plaintiff in an FCRA lawsuit, the defendant provided an incorrect 1099-MISC to both me, and my attorney, for the full amount. When separating the attorney's fees out, Turbo Tax refuses to complete the 1040 SCH 1. It does not populate some fields on part two "Adjustments to Income, " 24h, 24z, 25, and 26 which causes rejection. A second call to customer service suggested I print and mail the return instead of filling electronically. Why pay Intuit $65 if I have to mail it anyway. The agent also suggested I pay to get expert help. If i wanted expert help, I wouldn't have purchased this software in the first place. I have been using this software since 1989. I won't use it again!

[Opus 17]

Personal legal fees are not deductible except on cases of unlawful discrimination, or as an adoption expense.  The entire amount of the settlement or judgement is taxable to you, even though you paid part to the attorney.  In some states, you can get a partial deduction for legal expenses, but it is an itemized deduction.  (Line 24h is for legal fee related to unlawful discrimination only.)

If the FCRA complaint included a discrimination component, the fees might be deductible, but you need to manually edit the program to make the entry on line 24h, which you can do with the desktop program installed on your own computer, but not the online version.