Can I use Expert Services with an installed version of Turbo Tax? Or are Expert Services only available for the online versions?

[dstcruz]

Some of the other answers to very similar questions seem to be giving the directions on how to get Expert Services when using the online product, not the installed product.

[CarissaM · Accepted solution]

With the TurboTax Premier for the desktop it does include product support and tax review, but expert service is not available. I am including the instructions below to call and speak to a TurboTax specialist if you would like to receive product support.

https://ttlc.intuit.com/replies/3300041

[Anonymous]

Since WHEN?  Every year, the Desktop version of Premier offers free, tax expert, one-on-one help at any time.

Turbotax's greed at pushing the ridiculously expensive LIVE version, which you fail to even reveal in your answer, because you are peddling the absurdly priced LIVE version.

Look at your OWN site's page

https://turbotax.intuit.com/personal-taxes/online/

• Get homeowner tax breaks (Schedule A)
• Make the most out of charitable donations
• Jumpstart your return with last year's TurboTax info or import a PDF of your return from another tax software
• One-on-one help for answers, on demand* from a TurboTax specialist

[mesquitebean]

@ olwi00 

This is an old thread from last year where the threadowner was asking about desktop TurboTax.  "Expert Services" was a product name previously available in Online TurboTax, where it is now expanded and called "Live TurboTax."    The desktop products do not have that optional Live TurboTax upgrade.  It's to provide online users with on-demand access to a CPA/EA tax expert and a final review of the return prior to filing.   But that doesn't mean that desktop users cannot get product help and/or tax help.

If you are using Online TurboTax, the list of features you provided does allow you to talk to a "TurboTax specialist."   That does not necessarily mean you will automatically reach a CPA/EA tax expert.  I presume that's why it says "TurboTax specialist",  but it's possible that an agent you reach is both a tax expert and product expert or may transfer you.   But it's not the same direct access to a CPA/EA tax expert as the "Live TurboTax" feature provides.

Call and ask whatever you want.  If they can help you with it, they will.

Hours are 5AM-9PM Pacific (8AM-12 Midnight Eastern), 7 days/week

FAQ: What is the TurboTax phone number?
https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/using-turbotax/help/what-is-the-turbotax-phone-number/00/25632

Or you can use this contact form to get a number, or it may schedule a call back. 
https://support.turbotax.intuit.com/contact

[mesquitebean]

Hours are 5AM-9PM Pacific (8AM-12 Midnight Eastern), 7 days/week

FAQ: What is the TurboTax phone number?
https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/using-turbotax/help/what-is-the-turbotax-phone-number/00/25632

Or you can use this contact form to get a number, or it may schedule a call back. 
https://support.turbotax.intuit.com/contact

[mesquitebean]

Hours are 5AM-9PM Pacific (8AM-12 Midnight Eastern), 7 days/week

FAQ: What is the TurboTax phone number?
https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/using-turbotax/help/what-is-the-turbotax-phone-number/00/25632

Or you can use this contact form to get a number, or it may schedule a call back. 
https://support.turbotax.intuit.com/contact

[Anonymous]

The fact is that when you look at the list of Turbotax products, it purposely gives minimal information, and doesn't reveal that you are entitled to, with Desktop Premier, to get a CPA or EA.

Now, you are skirting the issue, and talking about LIVE, and even saying that you are not guaranteed to talk to a CPA or EA, but a "Tax Specialist".

This is absurd.  EVERY time I put in a request for "Complex Tax Issues" or "Schedule D", etc., I would always get a CPA or an EA, and everyone of them told me I was entitled to talk to them as I had Desktop.

Even your Customer Support agents tell you that you are entitled to talk to a Tax Expert.  Even though some of the not very swift ones say you are not, you simply either ask to speak to their supervisor, or call back.

You are not being straightforward, as you are skirting around the issue by not directly addressing my point, which I support from Turbotax's own website.  And, you are saying that "The desktop product do no have that optional Live Turbo Tax upgrade.  It's to provide online users with on-demand access to a CPA/EA tax expert and a final review of the return prior to filing. 

It is ONLY the final review of the return prior to filing that LIVE provides, and Desktop doesn't.  I could care less, and the saturated marketing of Live, I find utterly despicable.

I can purchase Desktop Premier for $69.95 at Costco, and not pay the nearly double from Turbotax directly.  So, who is really losing out because of their purposeful obliqueness?  TURBOTAX! 

[mesquitebean]

I'm a fellow user volunteering in this user community forum.  I don't work for or speak for TurboTax.   I only responded because I noticed you had posted in an old thread where the threadowner was inquiring about "Expert Services" for desktop product.  And since you are using Online TurboTax, I mentioned about how in Online TurboTax "Expert Services" had evolved to "Live TurboTax."

 I'm familiar with the way their products have worked over the years, and was only responding to their wording in the features you pasted from their website.    And knowing how TurboTax carefully chooses its words, that's why I suggested the meaning of what they likely mean by phrasing it as "TurboTax specialist" and why I suspect they worded it that way, as opposed to "tax expert." 

I said above:  "it's possible that an agent you reach is both a tax expert and product expert or may transfer you."    There are tax expert employees in this forum who answer both types of questions.  

Using this contact form (during business hours I posted above), you can enter whatever topic you want into it.  See who you get and if your question is answered.  If not, ask them to transfer you to someone in "tax help."  If they won't, then there's nothing I can do about it, obviously.

https://support.turbotax.intuit.com/contact

You wrote:  "I can purchase Desktop Premier for $69.95 at Costco, and not pay the nearly double from Turbotax directly."

I always recommend desktop product (CD/download) over Online.  And it does pay to shop around as long as it is a reputable authorized well-known retailer like Costco, Amazon, Staples, Office Depot, and a few others, and not a scam site. The desktop version has several advantages including the ability to prepare multiple returns and the popular Forms Mode for direct viewing/editing of forms during preparation, which Online TurboTax does not have.   It's also easier to print or to amend a return down the road, if needed.    Desktop Premier also includes a state program, while in Online Premier, a state return is an additional $50.

In the desktop product, there is a 24.99 fee to efile a state return (except free for New York state), but no fee to print and mail the state returns.

[Anonymous]

With your clarifications, I can see that you are not a Turbotax "plant", and are simply imparting what knowledge you have of Turbotax's deceitful and money-grabbing introduction of LIVE online.

TT also plays games with their language, as you intimate, cleverly using the term "Tax Specialist", which most anyone would assume it means a "Tax Expert".  What a dirty game this company plays!

Again, I have NEVER paid to talk to a REAL "Tax Expert", i.e. CPA, EA, or even Tax Attorney.  I have 50-80 emails from these credentialed experts to PROVE IT in just the last 3 years, and all the way back to 10 years ago.

And, the responses from the Turbotax employees positioned in these discussions are meant to push and market their LIVE rip-off, while being careful not to say certain things, i.e., you are entitled to speak for free as often as you like to to a CPA, EA when you have DESKTOP Premier. 

[Anonymous]

This is utter nonsense.  I have used Desktop Premier since at least 2012, and every year, I was told I would have free access to a Tax Expert, and specifically to a licensed CPA or EA.

This scam to push people to LIVE is a despicable practice by Turbotax, and one needs to get verification, like I did from both a supervisor, and from a Product Support person, and I have their names, and they created Case Nos. in my account, so there will be no question that I am entitled to this.

[tovaface]

I see this thread is 3 years old and the same issues remain.  TT has frustrated me for several years, then after a somewhat decent experience, I give them another chance.  Now I'm ready to pull my hair out.

 I've called support 2 numbers provided by TT and am unable to reach a real live person with either one.    The robotic service is worthless.  I have the download version of Home and Business Advantage with Expert tax advice included. One number, [phone number removed] gave the message that I need to schedule an appointment with an expert online. Yet after logging in to my account, there is no option to do so, only options for TT products to buy.  [phone number removed] connects with a robot who doesn't understand what I want and refuses to connect me to anyone who can help. How interesting that TT removes their own phone numbers from my post.  They are TOpOp GINTUIT and  TOpOpNBOWOpNN.

Does anyone have a secret passage through their tortuous system? 

Thank you.

[MichelleLO]

TurboTax Advantage does not include expert tax advice. Expert tax advice is included with TurboTax Live. Please see the below TurboTax Help Article for more information.

How do I get TurboTax Live?

@tovaface 

[tovaface]

@MichelleLO 

After finally getting through TT's moronic robot answering system, I was able to speak to an actual person. The rep was very nice, but couldn't offer much help. He informed me that TT stopped providing Live Expert support for the Home and Business product this year. It is telling that TT failed to inform me of that prior to automatically charging my credit card for the 2022 version of the product I've purchased for the past several years. It was only because of the expert support that I chose TT over its competitors in the first place. 

It is clear that TT is more interested in creating ads for the Super Bowl and TV than on providing excellent customer service. This customer will take his business elsewhere next year.