Our trusty mouse caused a little bit of a stir with last week’s story about Intuit yanking out key functionality from TurboTax Deluxe, and selling it back to customers via a $30 – $40 upgrade charge. There are now over 1400 one-star reviews on Amazon with consumers fuming over the changes and charges.
Game 1:
In the course of testing TurboTax Deluxe 2014, we discovered something curious with respect to the price they were charging for upgrades. If you needed to enter detailed information about investment transactions, for example, the program threw up this roadblock and advised that you would have to upgrade to “Premier” for an extra charge of $30.

When going back to that section subsequently, on occasion the program would change the price for the required upgrade:
*MOUSE PRINT:

The fee dropped from $30 to $25. Going back another time, however, it was back up to $30. There was no rhyme or reason for the varying prices. Also, in the self-employment income section, the user is alternately presented with either a $30 or $40 up-charge to go from TurboTax Deluxe to “Home & Business.” Maybe Intuit is testing various price points to see what amount will be most palatable for users.
Game 2:
Another strange pricing disparity cropped up last week on the TurboTax website. When we first checked prices for downloading the desktop version from their website on December 25, this was the pricing shown:

TT Deluxe was $59.99, with federal and state forms included.
Roughly two weeks later, on January 9th, it looked like things had changed.
*MOUSE PRINT:

Now it says that for $59.99 you seemingly only get the federal return because it says “state additional.” Clicking on the state additional link does not exactly clarify matters.

Well, which is it, Intuit? Is state included or not? There is a big difference between “state additional” and “additional state.”
Game 3:
And one last example. In the pricing charts above, buying TurboTax directly from Intuit seems to give customers a $10 discount off what appears to be the regular or list price. According to both Amazon and Target, however, the “list price” for each of the four editions of TurboTax 2014 is $10 lower than Intuit represents. For example, while Intuit says that TurboTax Deluxe is regularly $69.99 but is now on sale for $59.99, Amazon and Target say that $59.99 is the list price for TurboTax Deluxe to start with. Hmmm.
Looks like Turbo Tax is throwing a lot of lines in the water to see what they can get. Luckily watchdogs like Mr. Consumer are out there sniffing out the bait. I’m looking forward to seeing whether Turbo Tax continues to change or if they hold fast on their efforts.
The online version of Premier I purchased a week ago for $49.99 is now up to $54.99 this morning. Be interesting to see what I will finally be charged at checkout in a few months.
TurboTax with their confusing and conflicting information reminds me of the IRS publications.
Hope tax payers will remember this in the future.
This has been my go-to software for years. But it appears that it may be time to look for something better and cheaper.
Thanks for your astute watchdogging.
Also interesting is they no longer support older Mac platforms- you would have to use the online versions for OSx10.6 which has always been covered in the past- Almost bought software I couldn’t use!
Well, it appears that sometimes it doesn’t pay to shop early.
I purchased premier in December. The cost was $69.99. I just saw that Amazon is offering it for $54.99 to prime members.
I couldn’t recall what I had purchased last year and looked at the comparison chart for what I needed.
As for the State issue mentioned in the article, 1 state is included. Additional States are available for a fee. Looks like Intuit did a knee jerk reaction to the initial story with advertising rather then think it through.
Tim, check out Slickdeals for deals on tax softwares, I have never paid more than $20 on any tax software since I started preparing taxes 15 years ago. This year, intuit had an error on their website that was charging people $10 for premier and free for deluxe. There’s been errors or mistakes like this almost every year for the past few years. I got the premier but not sure if I’ll use it over the free H&R deluxe that I got. Either way, I’m covered this year for $10.
Investment Transaction(s)? That what they call it? Someone has sold their 1 or 2 stocks, oh excuse me – investments – and they are charging extra for this?
It’s not like this is Warren Buffet selling 10’s of thousands of shares of stock!
Turbo Tax is supposed to be do-your-own tax return. Schedule D and it’s sub-schedules should be FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE, like Larry Miller chimes on his ads!
Thanks Sam. I’ll make a note to check them next year.
Tim