Tax Preparation Softwares - Reviews And Deals

The time for working on our taxes has arrived. We have been sincerely monitoring numerous websites, forums, online and snail mail coupons for the best deal on tax preparation softwares. Our investigation shows that TurboTax from Intuit and TaxCut from H&R Block are the top two software packages for personal taxes.

A careful search of the web revealed that only a handful of websites have done reviews of tax preparation softwares. Here is short list of our findings:

• A very nice comparison chart can be seen at TopTenReviews.
• Detailed review of TaxCut at About.com.
• Detailed review of TurboTax at About.com.
  
• Detailed review of TaxCut Premium at CNet.
• Detailed review of TurboTax Premier at CNet.
  

After reading all the reviews we believe that both TurboTax and TaxCut are good softwares. The choice for the winner boils down to individual taste, prices, familiarity and convenience of importing last year's tax data. Apart from these two softwares there are quite a few other alternatives as well.

In our opinion a close third is TaxAct from 2^nd Story Software. They have both desktop and online versions. We have been using the TaxAct Online Ultimate Bundle for last 3 years. The reasons for choosing it are:

• e-file is fast and it saves some trees since we do not need to print and mail the returns.
  
• Another advantage of e-file is quick refunds that get direct deposited into our checking accounts.
  
• Among the top three, Taxact is the cheapest: $15.95 for Federal (efile) & One State (efile). Additional states are only $6.00 each. In comparison, other tax softwares charge anywhere between $25 to $50 for e-filing and additional states.
• Taxact's low price removes the pain of filling, mailing and tracking multiple rebate forms which is a must for buying the other software packets off the shelf to avail the special deals or bargain prices.
  
• It gives a comparison of Married vs Joint filing status. This is a big help since income levels may vary for married couples and one can check whether it is beneficial to file the taxes jointly or singly.
  
• The final return can be saved along with all the schedules as pdf documents.
• Being a comprehensive product Taxact supports almost all schedules. This is very useful since help might be needed with capital gains and distributions for investments.
• It can import previous years' tax return data seamlessly.
  
• The filled in tax data can be accessed online from anywhere.
• The interface is simple and easy to use.
• Tips and suggestions are provided all along.
• A nice feature of the software is that it tackles life events in a nice interview format.

We are assuming that a tax payer might have complicated tax scenarios and needs to e-file federal and state tax returns. To meet that need we feel that it is necessary to use a software for filing taxes. We hereby list some current deals for the top tax preparation softwares:

TaxAct Online Ultimate Bundle is the cheapest TaxAct product at $15.95. We have never come across any deals for TaxAct software. The reason for it might be the fact that it already has such a competitive price (without any mail-in-rebates).

The best Taxcut deal so far is TaxCut Premium + State Online at $19.97.

Our research shows that the Turbo product to root for is TurboTax Online FREE with eFile.



Please make sure that e-filing is included before you purchase the product at a bargain price or from some deal.

We would encourage our audience to evaluate their personal tax scenarios, identify their needs and then choose a product that best fits the bill. Please leave comments and share your experiences with respect to the software used for your tax filing this year.

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