Form 8615 Update

[eric31]

A follow up on my experience. After the first rejection today, instead of just filing again, I tried going back and walking through all the returns. I did not change anything, and none of the amounts changed, but I tried filing again anyway. This time the Federal return was accepted.

It appears that you need to go through the return to cause it to apply whatever fix they put in.

[KurtL1]

You are correct. You need to access the form for the update to make the new calculations.

[eric31]

Actually, it would help if you would clarify that a little bit. The first rejection was for form 8615, the second listed 1040. So which form needed to be "accessed" and how does one do that. In my case, I went through everything again, but that apparently was not necessary. So, which is the best procedure?

1. Open 8615 and 1040 in forms mode?

2. Open the 1099 DIV section again?

3. Something else?

Did I also need to open the State forms? I did, which was a pain as there was income from multiple states. I think it would really help if you to indicate exactly how to cause the specific forms needed to recalculate....

[LinaJ2020]

The Form 8615 issue has been fixed. You just need to update your program and try to re-file it.  If you are using the TurboTax CD/Download software program, open the program, from the top, under Online, select Check for Updates.  If the software does not update after you have done the step, I would suggest you contact the customer service department at TurboTax contact and ask for a new software push.  

For the second reject from Form 1040, what is the rejection code?  Is it a 1099-DIV related?

To fix both of the rejects, please follow instructions here to fix:  Fix a reject.  You need to follow prompts and instructions to make the corrections through the step-by-step interview sections and then re-file. You do not go directly to the forms under the Form mode to correct.  The edition could affect your state forms.  I would suggest you re-visit each state to go through the section again just to make sure.  

@eric31

[CommishJW]

Although I use Turbo Tax every year for our joint return, I pay a CPA to do another family member's trust and personal returns.  (This family member is subjected to the kiddie tax). Since I have already purchased TT for myself, I also use it to check the CPA's work every year. We always match on the personal return. Not this year. Having compared the worksheets side-by-side, all I can say is that TT's kiddie tax calculations are flat out wrong. Whether I choose the old or new method, I get very different (and quite obviously wrong) results vs. the CPA's professional software which also shows both methods. It doesn't surprise me that people are having their TT returns rejected by the IRS because of form 8615. 

[macuser_22]

Exactly what do you think is wrong  -  what on the worksheet is incorrect?     I can put in a bug report if I can duplicate and verify it.

[CommishJW]

All I have are the Turbo Tax return and the professionally prepared return which I can compare side-by-side. Most everything matches but when it gets to calculating the tax both ways, they don't match (and they aren't even close). Both Turbo Tax and the CPA did the prior year's return and started from the same point.

The differences are limited to Form 8615, and even then, some of the 8615 supporting worksheets match perfectly. I tried to delete 8615 and start over, but it wouldn't let me. So I deleted the investment income that triggers the kiddie tax, saved, and re-entered it, but the results ended up no different.

A hint that something is wrong is that every time I sign into that return I first get an alert saying "Here are the tax forms that weren't available for filing the last time you used Turbo Tax" and it lists 8615.  Well clearly, that's not correct as I've worked with the 8615 form for 2 months. @macuser_22 @LinaJ2020 

[Buddy14]

It's good to learn that an update to Form 8615 is on the way.  I am the parent of three children with unearned income.  After entering my taxable income, each child's tax amount increased way more than expected.  Upon further investigation, TT is incorrectly calculating the tax amount on Line 15.  In addition, I have not been prompted to enter any information about my income, specifically dividends and capital gains, which results in an incorrect tax amount on Line 9.  Can I expect these issues to be corrected when the update is released? 

Finally, we were not warned about Form 8615 needing an update.  Had I not been concerned about a surprisingly large tax liability, we wouldn't have discovered the tax calculation problems.  We might have even proceeded to the e-filing step.  If the update will not be available until February 26, a warning could have saved us a considerable amount of time.

[Anonymous]

@Buddy14 Did you mean to respond to this thread? It is from last year.

[Buddy14]

OOPS!  When I found this post, I only looked the month and day it was posted and assumed it had been posted today.  Now I realize I replied to a post that was exactly one year old.   I still have a problem with the way TT is calculating tax on Line 15 of Form 8615 for tax year 2020.  Maybe I need to start a new post?

[ChrisO2]

I'm not sure if the upgrade worked because using form 8615 today still shows incorrect underlying calculations that we cannot figure out where they came from.  Also, the references to line items is still incorrect.  Is TT planning on actually fixing the issues, including the underlying support calculations and documents?  I do not want to file and get penalized for an inaccurate return.  For example, the Sched D tax calculation worksheet which is used to determine the Form 8615 line 9 taxes does not add the qualified dividends that I entered for myself and my child.  Any updates?  thanks  I'm using the desktop (disk from Costco) version of TT.

[Buddy14]

Hi ChrisO2, I hope this reply helps resolve your concern.  After posting my problem with Form 8615, I discovered the conversation on this topic was over one year old!  I finally called TurboTax Support, and I was very pleased with the experience.   I think my problem (and maybe the one you encountered) happened because I somehow skipped a few steps the software was expecting in the Education Expense area.  The TT Support person walked me back to the beginning of the Education Expense questions.  After I worked through them all again, the Form 8615 tax calculations were correct (including references to Schedule D). 

I hope TurboTax takes a good look at how their software handles Education Expenses before next year.  It seems "choosing what I want to work on" can produce incorrect results.  I also find it odd that most of the posts in this forum are so very old.  Maybe some clarification on where to go for help could be added.  But I won't hesitate to call TT Support  for help should I encounter a problem like this in the future.  The time I spent looking for answers in this forum was not productive.

[ChrisO2]

Thanks.. I thought i was asking a question on a forum that was recent (2021).. we will work through all educational lines again to see if this fixes the issue.  thanks for your response.  We have decided to avoid TT next year at all costs - too many issues that they do not address.