Gambling Income

[Robin1943]

There is an error in how the program handles gambling incoming if you have both a W-4G and other gambling income.  The program first asks you to enter W-4G information.  It them switches to another page and asks for other gambling income.  The question asks you to enter "All prize and gambling income".  Since it says "All" I assumed it would include the previous entered W-4G amount.  Since had some other income I entered the total amount including W-4G.  When I finished the income section the summary page only showed the W-4G amount and not the total amount, however, on the Form 1040 Line 8 it had taken the W-4G amount and added it to the Total amount I had entered in effect doubling the amount of Other Income on the Form 1040.  To my mind there are two errors.  One, when asked for additional gambling income it should cleared only ask for additional income to the W-4G.  Two, the Income Summary page is not correctly showing the amount of Other Income which will be shown on Form 1040 Line 8.  Turbo Tax need to review the handling of this to matter to make it clear and correct.

[MonikaK1]

When you have received one or more Forms W-2G, you should enter them in TurboTax where the program asks for it so that they appear as a separate item rather than combined with other gambling winnings not reported to you on that form. This is to help ensure that the IRS Information Return matching programs will find it and you won't get an IRS notice for not reporting the income.

In both TurboTax Desktop and TurboTax Online, after you enter your W-2Gs, the next screen asks:

"Let's look for winnings not reported on  W-2G"

There, TurboTax provides entry fields for non-W-2G gambling winnings and for other types of prize winnings.

Line 8 of the Form 1040 states, "Additional income from Schedule 1, line 10". Schedule 1 contains a large number of items, some of which add to income and others which are subtracted from income and includes the gambling income.

If, after taking out the item of gambling winnings that had been entered twice, you still have concerns about the way the income items appear on your return, you can send us a “diagnostic” file that has your “numbers” but not your personal information. If you would like to do this, here are the instructions for TurboTax Desktop users:

1. From the black bar at the top of your screen, select Online
2. Click Send Tax File to Agent
3. Click Send on the message that pops up
4. TurboTax will create a "sanitized" copy of your return information with no personal info
5. Post the full token number here in this thread

Here are the instructions for TurboTax Online users: 

Go to the black panel on the left side of your program and select Tax Tools. 

1. Then select Tools below Tax Tools. 
2. A window will pop up which says Tools Center.  
3. On this screen, select Share my file with Agent. 
4. You will see a message explaining what the diagnostic copy is. Click okay through this screen and then you will get a Token number. 
5. Reply to this thread with your Token number. This will allow us to open a copy of your return without seeing any personal information.  

We will then be able to review your file to see what you are seeing, and we can determine what is going on in your return and provide you with a suggested resolution.