Filing My Taxes with Free File
Over the past two years I’ve used Turbo Tax to file my taxes because I parents always buy it and I usually was home often enough to find a time to sit down and fill it out. Plus I typically just had one W-2 and only few thousand dollars of income. Since I had multiple jobs in 2008 and now work full-time, I decided it was worth researching what tax filing method would work best for me.
My needs were as follows:
- Input multiple income sources (W-2s)
- Document my savings account interest (minimal) even though I didn’t have the 1099
- Document my “scholar” money that I didn’t get a W-2 for, but wasn’t used for tuition (so had to be claimed)
Initially I looked into H&R Block’s TaxCut. Someone told me it was free (under a certain income level) and easy to use. I created an account but ran into issues because I had the data needed, but not some of the forms. H&R Block’s TaxCut asks for numbers in certain boxes of form if you answer “yes” to having that type of income in 2008. Since I didn’t know what box numbers were what on the form, I was afraid that I would fill it out wrong.
At that point, I decided to wait to file my taxes for awhile. I thought I might get the forms in the mail, but didn’t. I did a bit of research and decided that using Free File from the IRS web site would probably be easiest. I gathered up all of my documentation and a calculator and filled out the form online. It was nice and easy. Personally, I liked using the actual form much better than a user interface that asks you questions and fills out the form for you. It was easier for me to figure out where everything needed to go on the form and why it was being asked for since I could see the entire form at once. After using Free File for my federal tax return, I used a similar program for the State of Maryland. In a couple of hours, my federal and state tax returns were filed and I had received an e-mail confirmation saying they were being reviewed.
A couple of weeks later, I have my tax returns in my savings account and don’t have to worry about April 15.
How did you file your taxes or what method are you planing to use this year?
