Charitable Cash Contributions line 12b glitch?

[m-l-j72]

I ran the review of my taxes and TurboTax found an error with what appears to be the $300 that it wants to enter on line 12b as the charitable contribution when taking the Standard Deduction. It says that since we are filing MFJ, $600 should be entered. It won't accept that either. I have gone to forms view and scrolled through Step by Step. Have I missed something or do I need to wait for a software update?

[RobertB4444 · Accepted solution]

@JotikaT2 has the perfect answer for this -

You can correct this by logging back into your TurboTax program and following the steps below.

1. Click on the Federal Taxes tab.

2. Select the Deductions & Credits tab.

3. On the screen titled How do you want to enter your deductions and credits?, select I'll choose what I work on.

4. Scroll down to Charitable Donations.

5. Select Update to the right of Donations to Charity in 2021.

6. You will see a screen titled Review All Your Charities.

7. To the right of any deductions entered, select Delete to remove any input.

8. You will then select Done with Charitable Donations.

9. On the next page (Deductions), scroll down to the bottom and click on Done with Deductions.

10. Proceed through the following screens until you pass the screen letting you know you are getting the Standard Deduction.  

11. The next screen titled Charitable Cash Contributions under the Care Act will allow you to enter your charitable contributions for 2021.  Enter your total cash contributions on this screen and select Continue.

This will correct the issue and allow you to continue with your tax return. 

Here's a link to her original answer.

[m-l-j72]

Thanks for the fast reply. I followed all the steps but when I got to the last step 11, I saw nothing about the CARES stuff. It just went on to "Other Tax Situations." My 2021 Premier program seems to be missing a step!

[max643]

That might fix line 12b but if it's like my return in TT Basic line 12c will still be blank (it should have the total of the Standard Deduction plus the $600 charitable deduction).

[m-l-j72]

Re-reading your instructions, I missed that I have to delete ALL my contributions. I'll go do that and see what happens...

[m-l-j72]

Boom! It worked. Thanks! The $600 has stuck in box 12b without any error squawks from Review/Analysis. Should I go back into the program and re-enter my $1340 in contributions? Since I am getting the Standard Deduction, I don't think it will do anything to the results besides giving my arthritic fingers some exercise.

[DaveF1006]

No. Do not go back and reenter your deductions. Leave it alone just to save yourself more heartache and save those arthritic fingers for other endeavors.

[m-l-j72]

Thanks! I won't mess with it anymore.

[SteamTrain]

... @DaveF1006 

So those who need to use the actual Charitable Contributions for their state Itemized Deductions, for that states that allow it...have to wait until TTX fixes the software, eh?

Any timeline on that?

_____________

Having to delete all those contribution entries is definitely just a temporary workaround.

[GeeTX]

I will wait to file and see if TT fixes the glitch, but what worked for me was to delete all my charitable contributions and then re-enter only a portion of them to equal $600 (the amount of the federal credit amount if filing a joint return with standard deduction and not itemizing).  This removed the error message for me. 

[ronaldcox3883]

This is an unbelievable, unmitigated disaster! I went through this process, deleted all my deductions on the federal side, and it messed up by state return, since the state return picks up the data from the federal part of the software. I went back and reentered the deductions in step mode, which fixed the state amount - and when I ran review line 12b was wrong again!!!!!!!!

Come on, Intuiit! FIX YOUR BUG!@!@! ... or maybe I should just cancel the download and use your competitors? If you can't fix this, what else is wrong? The "updates" used to show where the changes were being made, but this has been deleted. I am flying blind and NOT happy!!

[ronaldcox3883]

concur! They have a major bug and not doing anything about it

[ronaldcox3883]

wrong answer! If you do not reenter the data then you state return is messed up. FIX THE BUG

[TheRealTax2]

Changing value back to 600 at the error window and then skipping 2nd check worked. I was able to e-file while maintaining the 600 value on the fed 1040. I would advise that you read your state tax form instructions to be sure you're not required to adjust for the 600 deduction if you take this route. My state didn't mention it, unlike last year where the 300 contribution had to be added back on state return.

It takes me an hour to enter all my charitable contributions. No way I'm going to delete it. I rechecked manually form by form and line by line. All looks good.. Shame TT has to have issues every year with wild suggested fixes. Good luck guys. 

[ticenogle]

I think TT has fixed this error as of the 2/9/2022 update.  At least it's working on my version (Premier).