| Do it yourself! It's so easy! | | | | therefore had to show the income and expenses |
| The advertisements make it all sound so simple. | | | | for it. Accidentally, he entered the wrong amount |
| Just click here, type some information there, click | | | | for the income, a very wrong amount, way too |
| again here, type a little more there. Presto! | | | | low for the amount of time the property was |
| You’re finished, and it’s accurate! | | | | rented. Did the software recognize it? No. He filed |
| Yea, right. | | | | the return, and this year paid me to amend it |
| Go to Amazon and read the reviews for different | | | | after I discovered the error. |
| software packages. If you analyze them, you | | | | The second one entered the wrong amount on |
| may notice that there are two types of users: | | | | an important depreciation form, causing the |
| one that loves it, another that complains about it. | | | | software to calculate the depreciation incorrectly. |
| The complainers can be further split into three | | | | Did the software recognize it? No. She filed the |
| groups: those who are upset over paying extra | | | | return, and this year paid me to amend it after I |
| to e-file, those who have tech-support or | | | | discovered the error. |
| installation issues, and those who are upset | | | | These two clients share a characteristic of some |
| because the program calculated their taxes | | | | of the complainers on Amazon: they are not good |
| incorrectly. | | | | candidates for do-it-yourself tax preparation. Their |
| I want to discuss those in the last group. You | | | | situations are just too complex, and they would |
| might be one of them, and not even know it. | | | | have benefited greatly by having a trained set of |
| At the risk of stating something painfully obvious, | | | | human eyes examine the return. |
| I'd like to point out that tax software is not | | | | If your tax situation is even slightly complex and |
| human. This means that it doesn’t have a | | | | you use software, you run a risk of paying an |
| set of trained, human eyes to recognize when | | | | incorrect amount for taxes or filing incorrect |
| things just don’t look right. You know what | | | | returns than if you found a competent tax |
| I'm talking about. It's the human ability to make a | | | | preparer. |
| judgement call, the human ability to extrapolate | | | | America is full of do-it-yourself ideas, and mostly |
| information, the human ability to sense, not on a | | | | it's a great thing, but not if your returns are |
| mental level, but deeper than than, when | | | | incorrect; not if you pay something other than |
| something is wrong. This ability would have | | | | what you actually owe. |
| served that last group mentioned above. | | | | Regarding reviews on sites such as Amazon: I |
| From my own practice, I had two clients this | | | | generally disregard one line reviews that basically |
| season with errors on their 2004 returns. One | | | | say, "It's great," or, "I hate it," especially when |
| used software, and the other used an online | | | | written by people who have no other reviews to |
| service. | | | | their credit. Just looks fishy to me. |
| The first one owned rental property, and | | | | |