Question

There seems to be an error with regard to the CARES Act $300 charitable deduction for non-itemizers. Answering correctly, but says "Charitable Contribution too Large."

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
February 7, 2021
1 reply
0 views

I had more than $300 in contributions, and am entering $300 as prompted by Turbotax. However, it will not let me finalize my return and says that amount is "too large." I can move forward by entering 0, but of course that eliminates the deduction benefit and is inaccurate.

TurboTax Deluxe Online

MaryM428

This was a known error that has been corrected. But it is still showing up on your return. Follow the first steps 1-7. If it is still not corrected, the do the workaround steps 1-10.

Click Deductions and Credits
Select Review/Edit
Click Edit to the right of Standard Deduction Click OK, Sounds Good
Click Wrap Up Tax Breaks
Click Continue
Make sure that $300 is filled in and then click Continue
Click Lets Keep Going

If there is still a problem, then do this workaround:
Here is the work around for claiming the $300 Charity Deduction:

In TurboTax select Federal in the panel on the left
Select Deductions & Credits at the top of the page
Under Your Tax Breaks - Charitable Donations
Click START to the right of Donations to Charity in 2020
Click YES
Click ADD next to Money
Type in the name of the charity that you donated to
Type the amount of the donation
Select Done with Donation
Select Done

Now the $300 will appear on Line 10B and in the Charitable Contributions screen

J

jeffhorwichAuthor

I solved this with the help of some great TurboTax reps over the phone. The problem was this--and I would characterize it as an oversight in the TurboTax code: even though I was taking the standard deduction and TurboTax had not taken me through screens related to itemized charitable deductions, in the background it had automatically carried forward my list of charities from the prior year. Having those blank entries in the invisible background was causing this mysterious error. By going in and manually deleting those entries, it eliminated this error related to this year's $300 cash charitable donation credit for non-itemizers.

J

jeffhorwichAuthor

The workaround suggested by Mary might also work (by assigning charities to match your $300). However, we solved it by simply eliminating these entries.