unnecessary questions about donations of stock

[TigerMO]

I made three donations of stock to non-profit organizations. The stock was transferred directly to them, so there is no capital gains. Why is TurboTax asking me for the date of acquisition and cost basis? Neither of those is relevant to my donation.

[AmeliesUncle]

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@TigerMO wrote:

Neither of those is relevant to my donation.

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Yes, they are.  It helps determine the which charitable contributions rules it falls under and your charitable contribution amount.

[TigerMO]

Could you please tell me more? As long as I've held the stock more than 12 months, the entire amount of the stock's FMV is deductible, isn't it? Not just the adjusted basis.

[MarilynG1]

The basic rule is that your contributions to qualified public charities, colleges and religious groups generally can't exceed 60 percent of your Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) (100% of AGI in 2020 for qualified charities).

• The caps are a bit lower for gifts to other types of nonprofits. When it comes to gifts of appreciated property, the limit drops to 30 percent of AGI.
• If these restrictions limit your write-off in the year of the gift, the excess deduction carries over to the next year.

Here's more info on Charitable Donations.

@TigerMO 

[TigerMO]

Sorry, @MarilynG1, but you misread my question. I wasn't asking what the contribution rules were. There's no information in the Charitable Donations link you sent that answers my question.

I was asking why TurboTax was asking for the cost basis and date of acquisition for gifts of publicly traded stocks. As long as the stock is held for at least 12 months and gifted directly to the charity, there is no computation of capital gains. Therefore, there is no need for knowing the cost basis. Delete that question.

The date of acquisition is only necessary to see if the stock had been held for 12 months, so why couldn't TurboTax have a question in EasyStep that asks if you've held the stock for 12 months or longer? 

[MarilynG1]

Here's a screenshot of Form 8283 where stock donations were entered in the interview.  You can see that both the Cost Basis and FMV are shown in the calculations.  The article references that donations may be limited, depending on the type of organization donated to, but can be carried over.  After you file, you'll get a link to enter comments/suggestions, so please feel free to fill that out.

@TigerMO 

[TigerMO]

The IRS Instructions for Form 8283 provided the complete answer to my question.

It says that you can usually deduct gifts of stock at their full fair market value, but there are some exceptions when you have to reduce the fair market value by the amount of any appreciation. TurboTax is trying to determine if you (the taxpayer) meet any of those stated exceptions, but the questions it asks don't do a good job of checking to see if those exceptions apply or not. That should be handled better before asking for the cost basis and the date of acquisition. If the exceptions don't apply (which they didn't for me), then those two questions are irrelevant and shouldn't be asked. 

@MarilynG1