TurboTax Responses
The Nemo Memo

Our first reader letter arrived shortly after the review was posted.

Mr. Nemerovski, you wrote that:

“Downloading Intuit’s latest updates took under seven minutes at moderate broadband speed.”

Not being a highly-paid journalist, *I* am on a 56 Kb dial-up. It took me over two hours to download the required TurboTax updates (two nights ago). There was no message in the update process indicating the total size of the files that needed to be downloaded, so I sat at my desk, waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

While I am grateful that Intuit is doing a thorough job of making sure that the software is accurate, I feel that your glowing review needs to be taken down AT LEAST ONE NOTCH until Intuit provides one of two things as a courtesy to their paying customers:

1. An estimate of the size/time requirements for the update(s), based on connection speed and the current traffic load on their servers. As in, “OK, Curt. You’re not going to be able to work on your taxes tonight. Just go to bed, because I’ll be processing for a while,” or

2. A coupon for a free update CD from the original retail point of purchase when the size of the update approaches 25 MB.

I feel like charging Intuit $49.95 for the time I spent staring at my iMac’s screen.

Sincerely,

Curt

Then a second reader weighed in.

I’ve finished using TurboTax Deluxe 2002 for this year. I’ve used TurboTax/MacInTax for several years.

I’ve found that over the years, the deluxe version “Help Resources” has decreased in quality. The first year I used a deluxe version, it included two tax text books, plus the government regulations.

The past couple of years and this year, it has only one tax text plus the government regulations.

Most disturbing was the question I asked about the standard daily expense allowance when working away from home. The answers from both the government and text resources gave information concerning 2001__ “…in 2001 the standard allowance….” There was no mention of the allowance rules for 2002.

Did they just copy last year’s resources??????

thanks for any help getting to the bottom of this.

George

Three strikes and I’m out.

Dear Mr. Nemerovski:

The timing of your review (for me) is quite good, since I just started using the product this week. Have there been any reports of Turbo Tax not working on dual processor Macs? I have a two QuickSilvers, a single 867 MHz and a dual 1 GHz. The installer would not run on the dual machine. Any attempt to run the installer would result in a relaunch of the Finder. Similarly, any attempt to access the “TurboTax Deluxe 2002” folder on the CD also resulted in the relaunch of the Finder. I found this odd, but could find no work around. Unfortunately, Intuit on-line tech help couldn’t provide a solution up to this point either.

Thank you for considering this issue.

Steve

The first correspondent quickly wrote back to say:

I am quite satisfied with the final workings of the product (I was even able to avoid a lot of work by downloading my W-2, because my company uses ADP), but the update process left a lot to be desired.

Curt

I then contacted Intuit, publisher of TurboTax, and received the following information:

For the third reader, there have been no reports of problems with any of TurboTax components running on a dual processor system. Unfortunately, we would need additional information from customer. For example, has there been any problems running other CDs on his computer.

For the first issue, I have forwarded these comments on to the product management team. This is always helpful to the team here when considering future products and items that will make the customer experience better.

Regarding the second reader, we would again need more information as there are many items that are considered “standard allowances”. He may be referring to the area of per diem for lodging, or food, etc. If he could send more information about what exactly he was looking for or a screenshot or even the form he was dealing with, it may help to give them an idea of where to look. Note that, each year every effort is made to include the most updated information for the publications that is available at the time of the product release.

I hope this helps.

I asked Intuit what the best way will be to handle so many reader inquiries. Here comes the last word on the topic, until we address TurboTax in 2004.

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We do have technical support set up for customers to contact Intuit regarding various issues/comments they may have. Just go to TurboTax Support and go first to the FAQs. If a question is not answered there, they can then move to step 2, which is chat. If they are still unable to resolve an issue, they move on to step 3 which is phone support. All of this support is free and an easy, convenient option for customers. If they choose not to go through the 3 steps and want to go immediately to the phone, they will then be charged.

This is probably the best resource as issues are then evaluated directly with the customer, on a one-on-one basis.

Thanks to all readers of MyMac.com, plus every company that cooperates with us directly. We appreciate your support.

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John Nemerovski