Question

Will TurboTax ever improve the foreign tax credit forms (1116)? It's a nightmare filling these in and checking them.

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
June 1, 2019
1 reply
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Employee

I hear you - I always dread entering foreign taxes paid from various 1099s because I know what's coming next.

Unfortunately foreign taxes are one of the most convoluted and complicated sections of the tax code, and you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Maybe a sow's ear that sorta resembles a silk purse when you cock your head and squint, but I agree it's not much fun (especially when you're under April 15 pressure) and I don't think there's a whole lot we can do to make it easier. Good luck and enjoy a cold one when you're done, you deserve it.

P

peter-ludemannAuthor

Even so, TurboTax could make it easier. For example, when I create a fake 1099-R for foreign pension income, they could give me the option of "foreign tax withheld". Similarly for a1099-DIV or 1099-INT (which I also create from a Canadian NR4).

And the TurboTax inputs merely copy the dreadful IRS forms, so I have to remember what countries A, B, C are. Etc., etc. This whole section needs some UX love.

Also, the experience for filling in form 8938 is similarly awful. And it wouldn't hurt if TurboTax created a worksheet with the information needed to fill in the FBAR, nicely organized.