I have used Tax Act for many years. Web-based, nothing to download. All my information are transferred to next year automatically. I get a year to year comparison. We used a CPA one year, who missed an income we had, and we had to pay a penalty. So no more CPA.

However, this last year TaxAct (and also TT, as I heard) was not able to handle a one time tax rule change we have in our region. So a lot of actions have to be done manually (i.e. paying estimate tax, no electronic filing). So I have no confidence in any tax filing programs.

I have used Tax Act for many years. Web-based, nothing to download. All my information are transferred to next year automatically. I get a year to year comparison. We used a CPA one year, who missed an income we had, and we had to pay a penalty. So no more CPA.

However, this last year TaxAct (and also TT, as I heard) was not able to handle a one time tax rule change we have in our region. So a lot of actions have to be done manually (i.e. paying estimate tax, no electronic filing). So I have no confidence in any tax filing programs.

Did anybody ever notice that the first thing a CD does is download the actual current program? Not only tax prep software but all software of any value. Why? Of course, the first reason is they want your unique key before activation of the program. It is called theft prevention. And CDs are way too slow and small to load the full program in a reasonable time. And the IRS doesn’t actually approve the programs until long after those boxes and CDs are entered into the supply chain. Oh, I haven’t owned a computer with a built in disk drive in many moons. However, I do know approximately where my $10 dollar USB drive is stored.