The Best Free Tax-Prep Software For April 15, 2015
Your tax situation is simple. You dont own a business, you have no taxable investments, youre not paying student loan interest, you dont own a home and you dont itemize deductions (see An Overview of Itemized Deductions.).
When your tax situation is that basic, you dont need a tax preparer and the popular online platforms will charge you zero for filing your federal return. What are your options?
The IRS doesnt offer free tax filing, but it does partner with all of the most common companies. Go to the IRS Free-File page to learn more.
Probably the best known of all tax software platforms, TurboTax will let you easily file your basic federal taxes online for free. Additionally, it includes support for earned income credits something that most of the other well-known platforms do not. Filing a state tax return costs $27.99 per state.
There's a good reason TurboTax is being rather generous this year.
Because of some missteps by its parent company, Intuit, TurboTax is fighting hard to regain the trust of its long-time customers.The company faced a ferocious backlash when it moved features that used to be part of a lower-priced package into more expensive ones. Second, the Minnesota Department of Revenue temporarily stopped accepting TurboTax returns, citing potentially fraudulent activity." It resumed them after Intuit implemented new targeted security measures.
In the end, TurboTax had to roll back its changes, offer a rebate to customers who had already paid the extra charges and take other steps to keep people from using its competitors. This has made it one of the best values for 2015.
Often seen in Wal-Mart stores, Jackson Hewitts free offering is similar to most where the basic service is free, but a state return will cost you. In this case, youre going to pay an eye-popping $34.95 to file that state return. Most others are much cheaper.
Filing your federal return is easy and the state return will cost you $9.99 less than many other competitors. H&R Block offers very few options in the free version, but if you only need a few more features, its lowest-cost paid plan is only $19.99 (note that the cost of filing a state return shoots up to $36.99 with this plan).
TaxACTmight have the most impressive free offering. It offers more complex options including investments, itemized deductions and small business scenarios. What it doesnt allow is importing of prior year returns or current W-2s and other tax forms. To get that, you will have to spring for the Deluxe edition; this costs $12.99 and a state return is $7.00, for a total price tag of $19.99. The free basic federal return, plus state filing, costs $14.99.
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The Best Free Tax-Prep Software For April 15, 2015