Update: We have our winners! I’ve notified the winners about collecting their prizes. Thanks for playing!
It’s the Fourth Annual Tax Filing Horror Contest at taxgirl.com!
Have a horrible tax filing story? Car break down blocks from the post office? Ran out of paper in the printer? Dog ate your return?
Tell me your worst tax filing story – or simply complain, whine or ramble about the thing (or things) you hate most about filing taxes – and win.
Here are the rules:
- Post your tax filing horror story in the comments below. It can be as long or as short as you want. Please don’t include any personally identifying information that you don’t want to be made public (your AGI, address, etc.).
- Enter as many times as you like – but you must post a different story or comment each time. Links and pingbacks while appreciated, don’t count.
- My normal comment policy applies (you can read it here). I have standards, you know.
- I love my foreign readers, too, but this contest is for US residents only.
- You must leave a valid email address (it will not be made public) so that I can contact you if you are a winner.
- Deadline is February 28, 2010, at 11:59 pm EST.
We don’t judge here. Okay, I usually do. But I won’t this time. Instead, I will randomly select the winner from all of the qualified entries. FIVE lucky winners will walk away with free software from Intuit. Intuit has donated five versions of TurboTax Premier (online version) for the contest.
In this economy, you don’t get much for free anymore. So what are you waiting for? Share your story – the worst thing that ever happened to you while filing your taxes – or the thing you hate most about filing taxes – and win big.
It’s April 15th, 2008, and knowing I owed taxes, of course, I stalled mailing it…”No WAY does the govt get a penny more of my money before it’s time” I thought.
As I leave to go to lunch to try and beat the lines, much to my horror I discover a BOOT on my vehicle!! Apparently, a few forgotten parking tickets here and there reared their head at the utmost inopportune moment, not to mention a overdue registration!!!
Rushing first to the courthouse, I wait patiently IN LINE just to be told that I ALSO need to go to the DMV as well!! And after the DMV, I was told to return with the receipt to the courthouse and the boot will be removed.
Finally, afterHOURS of lines,the boot was removed, and I rushed to try to get to the post office only to be pulled over for speeding on the way to the post office!! (The officer was kind enough to give me a warning after I explained my circumstances, thank goodness!!)
Finally, and without fail, I arrive at the post office, and awaiting me? Another LINE!!! But luckily, I made it on time to send off my return, avoiding a penalty for filing late!!
I filled in the incorrect lines in my taxes once. I paid state tax for gross of my income in one state when I was only to pay a certain amount (since I only earned a certain amount in that state and paid tax to another state).
I had to fill out some amendments after talking to accountant. The hardest part of this was procrastinating to the last minute! Finally my refund arrived weeks later.
The thing I dislike most about taxes beyond making mistakes is gathering all the paperwork, I’m still waiting for lots of stuff!
I don’t have any real horror stories, just one major gripe. My wife has a stock purchase plan with her employer (ESPP). She gets a nice discount on the stock with no fees and dividend reinvestments. They withhold a chosen dollar amount from each paycheck, and purchase stock every six months at the lowest price of those six months. Holding for a couple of years is a great way to save and make a good return if her company does well. But … when you sell the stock and have to file your tax return you have to calculate multiple different purchase dates and prices, including all of the dividend reinvestment dates and costs. It took me hours to enter all the transactions even though they all were just pennies. I dread the next time she sells some ESPP stock!
This was in my public accounting days but one of my clients was a bank in St. Joseph about three hours away from me in Detroit. The client got us their information on September 14 (extension) and I was able to turn it around and get it done that day but not before the Fedex deadline came and went. Anyway, on Septermber 15, my whole day was literally in the car delivering this return and then coming back home.
I am using a pseudonym here, to avoid embarrassing anyone, but I guarantee this is a true story and a cautionary tale.
This story happened to my aunt, who is well into her seventies, in poor health, with multiple ailments, and living by herself on a very limited income. In most recent years, her only income is Social Security, so she has rarely had a filing requirement.
However, in 2008, she closed out an IRA, so she had taxable income to report for the first time in a while.
Due to a bunch of health problems, it is very difficult for her to walk any distance at all, but she does have a home computer and she is very successful at surfing the web, emailing, etc., and so she went to the irs.gov website to see about her do-it-yourself options.
The irs.gov website told her that she was eligible for FreeFile, so she decided to use what she called “TaxTurbo” to efile her taxes.
After she had entered all her numbers into the program, she learned that she owed the government money, so she sent in a check for what she could and requested an installment agreement to pay the rest.
Unfortunately, it now appears that she mailed in the check for partial payment but never actually pressed the “Send” button in Turbotax to submit the return she had prepared.
The IRS recently contacted her to say “We got your check with the 1040V you mailed in last April, but we never got your return, so where is your return?” The efile deadline for 2008 returns was long past by the time the IRS contacted her, so she printed out a paper copy of her return and mailed it in. She has now received a bill from the IRS assessing a large amount of penalty for “failure to file on time” as well as interest.
She acknowledges that she owes the additional tax liability and the interest, but the penalty for “failure to file on time” seems really unfair under the circumstances.
I use Turbotax myself, but I’ve never efiled my own return, so I don’t know what sort of acknowledgement Turbotax gives after you press the “send” button. I just print out two copies of our return, mail one return in with the check for the balance, and keep the other for my record. When the IRS cashes my check, I assume the IRS has processed my return. I can certainly understand why she would have assumed the same thing when she got the bank statement showing that the IRS had cashed her check.
I’m disturbed that my proud and independent elderly aunt, who was trying to do what the government encourages people to do by efiling, has now been assessed penalties for what appears to be an honest error on her part.
PS You don’t have to put my name into the hat for the free TurboTax. We have already purchased one.
My pet peeve is ambiquity of rules and regs, in which they try to cover every possible case that might come up and only serve to confuse everybody, sort of like a programmer’s nested “if then… else” statements. For instance, I am a retired former Federal employee whose annuity is entirely from CSRS, no Social Security benefits other than Medicare. I have not worked for wages in 2009. So I am trying to figure out if I am entitled to the $250 stimulus bonus. On the one hand, it says all Federal pensioners are entitled to it, but the other hand says, no, you have to have earned wages in 2009. I know some Social Security retirees who received a $250 check in 2009 even though they never worked a day for wages in 2009. Some recent piece of legislation was supposed to straighten this out so that all Federal pensioners would receive it as a tax credit. All that is necessary is to fill out Schedule M, they say. Items 10 and 11 of that form are supposed to fix it. Item 11 asks: “Did you… receive an annuity in 2009 for services performed as an employee of the U.S. Government… from work not covered by social security?” My answer has to be “yes and no.” I did not work for wages covered by social security, but I did pay into social security via payroll tax to be eligible for Medicare, the only social security benefit I receive. I feel sure that the intent of the law was to make Federal annuitants on a par with those who worked and paid into Social Security and are receiving a Social Security check. In a sense, most Federal annuitants probably paid something into Social Security tax to be eligible for Medicare, thus could be said “covered” by SS, even though none of their annuity is based on “wages” covered by SS. So am I entitled to $250 or not?… sure can’t tell by items 10 and 11 of Schedule M.