What is the retirement savings contribution credit

[margie1]

can I get credit for my retirement off the job.what was taken out of my check doing the year /

[DawnC0 · Accepted solution]

Possibly, however the amount, if any, is dependent on a few factors, but TurboTax will figure that for you.  You only need to enter your W-2 to get credit for your 401(k) contributions.  You're eligible for the credit if you're:

• Age 18 or older;
• Not a full-time student; and
• Not claimed as a dependent on another person’s return.

This credit is given to encourage savings.  The Saver’s Credit (Retirement Savings Contribution Credit) can be taken for your contributions to a traditional or Roth IRA; your 401(k), SIMPLE IRA, SARSEP, 403(b), 501(c)(18) or governmental 457(b) plan; and your voluntary after-tax employee contributions to your qualified retirement and 403(b) plans.  Beginning in 2018, contributions to ABLE accounts also qualify for the credit.  

The amount of the credit is 50%, 20% or 10% of your retirement plan, ABLE account or IRA contributions up to $2,000 ($4,000 if married filing jointly), depending on your adjusted gross income (reported on your Form 1040).  The chart in this IRS link shows what your credit rate is based on your AGI:   Saver's Credit 

[slynndragon]

Apparently you can't get it anyway on TurboTax free edition, only Deluxe. I just wanted to see what it would be, and then said "I'll upgrade later" because it didn't have an option for no, and was forced to upgrade to deluxe at the end or clear and do it all over again and just not check if I qualify. Very confusing.

[Cedo]

If you're using TurboTax software and it's denying your eligibility to get this credit despite qualifying for it, make sure to fill out the retirement section that asks for your IRA contributions before trying to get this credit. Otherwise it will tell you that you don't qualify, instead of asking whether you had IRA contributions and asking you to fill that out.

The fact that a conversion is technically considered a "distribution" despite not distributing funds out of the accounts, and possibly because it generates a 1099-R, can generate some confusion here. I thought the TurboTax software was mistaking my roth rollover/conversion for a distribution at first, but once I added my IRA contributions, the credit was applied.

[John Doe]

This kind of messed up on TurboTax's part, but you can actually get the Retirement Savings Contribution Credit applied without upgrading to Deluxe, BUT you have to switch to a different "free" TurboTax plan...that TurboTax doesn't tell you about. If you go through the IRS website, here: https://apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/browse-all-offers you can switch to a plan called "IRS Free File Program delivered by TurboTax". Follow that and TurboTax will give you an option to switch to that plan. Even though TurboTax knows you qualify (based on what you've told them already), they seems to be playing dumb so you upgrade to the paid Deluxe version.