Why can't I copy/paste passwords into the import brokerage logon screen?

[swabbinsky]

must be a win/mac diff.  Unless a recent update changed this.  I entered mine manually because it wouldn't allow me to paste id/pwd for fidelity, schwab, or vanguard.  Not sure I attempted it with bank accounts as that is easier to just type.

[macuser_22]

I tried it with my Schwab account also and it worked fine.    Sorry but I don't have a Windows computer to try it from, but I do not know why Windows would be different.

[jbowler]

@macuser_22: but I do not know why Windows would be different.

The Microsoft and Apple systems are very very different.  "Why" is because Microsoft did what it did and Apple did what it did (with some support, I admit, from Microsoft).

It's only an illusion, and as you effectively point out a poor one, that "paste" in Windows NT (the part of Microsoft's system that implements this) is the same as "paste" in Apple's BSD based "shell" (the part of MacOS that implements this).

Of course your point does make everything Intuit have said totally ridiculous, unless they are saying that they don't care about their "security" on Mac OS, or maybe that Apple have paid them more to make a working program...

[jbowler]

I post a summary every three months or so because Intuit know about this issue and haven't fixed it.  They know about it because various posters have complained to Intuit customer support and been told it's for their own good (even though, if they buy a Mac, they don't deserve the same motherly care, as I previously posted).

So there is no fix to downloading brokerage accounts on Windows.  But there is a perfectly workable work-round; AutoHotKey.  It is a simple Windows app, now available on the Windows Store (which should reassure anyone out there concerned about security) which is able to type stuff into other Windows apps.  It's not a solution of itself - you need to write a little script, a file to drive it, which associates a single key press with the action of taking whatever is on the clipboard and typing it into wherever Windows is typing stuff.  There are various versions of the script in this thread.

The fix works everywhere, although it no longer seems to be required in Quicken, an ex-Intuit app that I use.  I wonder why?

The alternative to this, an alternative that may be better, is do not download your Brokerage account.  This works because some years ago the Federal Government required brokerage firms to give all the information the IRS required to the IRS...  There was a transition period during which brokerage firms could deny knowing the cost basis of shares we sell; it was lame because clearly they did know for the cases that affected me, but it still happens if you transfer shares between different brokerage companies.  Nevertheless you still don't have to file individual transactions, as TurboTax does if you make the mistake of downloading a brokerage account, only the totals.

Downloading a brokerage account basically puts TurboTax into show-all tell-all mode; every single transaction is written into your tax return.  That's 17 extra pages in my 2020 tax return; guess what, I won't be downloading my brokerage data to TurboTax in 201, even if I use TurboTax...

If you use TurboTax (I assume that's why you are reading this) you can skip the download and just follow the instructions to enter the summaries of the data, which your brokerage firm gives you.  If you have transactions where the firm really doesn't have the cost basis you are going to have to find that anyway.  I don't have any, so I don't know what TurboTax does.  It wouldn't surprise me if it just set the basis to 0 - think about that.

[swabbinsky]

There are a number of caveats people need to be aware of when doing as you suggested.

Yes you can summarize.  That's been available some time.  But you do need to separate out certain items.  I don't know everything here, but I wash sales are one of these.  I put in two short term covered entries this year.  The one wash and everything else.  And you need to tell TT so it creates the proper code on the tax forms.

Cost basis can vary.  For example if you inherit the stock, the cost basis will be the cost at the time of the decedents death AND is always treated as long term.  So if you father purchased a stock in January 2021, died in March and you sell it in September, the cost basis in the March value and it is still long term.  Unless this occurred in i think 2010 and there are tricky rules because of Congressional mucking about.

You do need to account for dividend reinvestment.  That's reason I kept Quicken as it handles the cost basis for stocks I've held since the early 80s and I don't have to figure out the basis for almost 40 years of dividends.

I haven't run in to the situation but if you truly don't know the cost basis of some old stock, I think there are some IRS rules to handle that.  You certainly don't  want to use 0 unless you really have to.

[jbowler]

We are not offering tax advice here.  Rather advice as to how to use TurboTax; the point is that the brokerage firms report information to the IRS and they also report the same information plus extra to you.

TurboTax includes the extra, wantonly.

We need to be honest; so if we know we have an exceptional situation we have to take care.  I used the example of a 0 basis as a counter example - that was something I was suggesting TurboTax might do if the brokerage company didn't know the basis - and that was something that we do need to watch out for.  TurboTax really, seriously, does not help with complex tax situations like this.  The best they do is tell you you have to work it out for yourself; I know this from experience.

Brokerage firms correctly report wash sales within the account, possibly within the firm.  I know this from Schwab and TD Ameritrade reports.  If you have multiple brokerage accounts (as I do) you know the danger of wash sales.   If you have an IRA you ++know the danger of wash sales.  TurboTax will not help you; it does not correctly recognize the buy and sale of the same stock within different accounts even though TurboTax has all the data to do so.

Dividend reinvestment is something I abandoned at the end of the last millennium.  At that time it was a reporting nightmare - TurboTax did not support cost basis averaging, most likely it still doesn't.  Quicken could generate the numbers but it was still an Intuit product so basically as trustworthy as a dog on acid.

These days brokerage firms are simply required by law (? Obama executive action) to correctly record the numbers so dividend reinvestment is attractive as a self correcting (evolutionary) investment strategy, based on actual return not fictitious potential 😉

If you are seriously trying to draw me into a debate about stepped up basis I suggest you go suck your toenails.

[swabbinsky]

not trying to debate and would rather not suck my toenails but there are other readers who could be helped by knowing it's not always simple.

As for reporting basis the firms still don't have to except for equity purchases newer than roughly 2012 (requirement varies with stocks, mutual funds etc).

[steved]

I can't believe this is still happening in 2021.  This can't be more than a 2 hour fix.  The incompetence (or perhaps arrogance) of Intuit is really astonishing. 

[aboutreadytoleave]

Does anyone know if intuit fixed this issue for the 2021 filing? I haven't purchased my tax software yet (I cancelled the auto-purchase option last year). I'm thinking about trying a competitor if this isn't fixed.

[AkinaLO]

Unfortunately, there are currently no new workarounds for this issue. We will send an update if anything changes.

[aboutreadytoleave]

I appreciate your honest and quick reply @AkinaLO . Sadly this means for the first time in decades I will be using a different software solution for my taxes. I will probably not have all my forms until early February, so intuit decides to care about this issue and fix something that is stupid easy to fix, let me know.

[jbowler]

Remove that reply; I was replying to the wrong post.

[jbowler]

---

@aboutreadytoleave wrote:

Does anyone know if intuit fixed this issue for the 2021 filing? I haven't purchased my tax software yet (I cancelled the auto-purchase option last year). I'm thinking about trying a competitor if this isn't fixed.

---

I'm repeating a post I made on this thread in April last year, but it is worth repeating.

You almost certainly do not need to download brokerage accounts into TurboTax and if you don't need to you don't want too.

This is because the TurboTax download insists on downloading all your brokerage transactions then adding them to your tax return.  In my 2020 tax return I ended up with 17 extra pages of tax return as a result of this..  This is on a tax return with 41 pages which includes a Schedule C and the sale of a rental property.  The extra, spurious, pages are form 8949 for transactions which were then summed on line 1b and 8b of Schedule D instead of 1a and 8a; see the "Note:" at the start of parts 1 and 2 of 8949.

Yeah, maybe you don't want to enter the figures yourself because you might make a typo, but then having to install the work-round for the no-paste-the-password problem, i.e. autohotkey and trying to remember how to use it again (since we only use it once a year) is a lot more work than just getting someone else to double check the number entries, or doing it yourself several times.

What is more, what happens if you get a modified 1099-B?  This is normal with Schwab and TD Ameritrade.  Well, you need to send in a modified tax return and you have to mail that.  So you have to find the modified line in the original 8949, correct it, then work out exactly which sheets of paper to print out and return, plus how to explain that.  If you didn't send those unnecessary forms in in the first place all you have to do is take just one line off the corrected 1099-B (the total at the end) and enter that in just one place.

Someone complained last year about wash sales, but Schwab seems to get wash sales right (see my previous answer, search for "toenails".)  How does TurboTax help with wash sales?  Well, not a lot I think - Schwab has already corrected the basis, but if you did a wash by selling in one account and buying within 31 days in another IRC you have to do all that work yourself; manually correcting individual lines on 8949 because so far as I know TurboTax does not identify wash sales between accounts (does it even identify them within an account?)    If you want a wash sale to transfer shares between accounts without a tax consequence (which you can only do anyway if you hold losers) you are going to have to do some work yourself.

[AdrienneS]

I will probably be doing the same.  

[BrazenLapin]

I wholeheartedly support voting with your dollars – historically this hasn't been an issue on macOS so I'll give that a try.