TurboTax Deluxe 2003 [Old Version]

I was angry last year but TurboTax did the right thing and got rid of their "product registration."

I though the grass would be as green on the TaxCut side of the fence but it was not as good as TurboTax. Several times TaxCut actually made me do calculations manually and even once told me the software couldn't handle my situation. TurboTax has never left me hanging and I am back. (...)


Surprised at all the negative reviews   June 17, 2004
onlyaymie (Smyrna, GA USA)
6 out of 7 found this review helpful

I am so surprised to see all the negative reviews. My turbotax worked fine. I usually do my taxes by hand, but I have used turbotax in the past. I did download any updates that became available. I also got the state version and e-filed for both. All of it went incredibly smoothly. If you just have to fill out 1040EZ it isn't worthwhile, but the auto fill in is a big time saver for 1040 filers, especially if you have to do the capital gains calculations.


Confused by the negative reviews   January 22, 2004
J. DEGREY (Centerville, UT United States)
23 out of 33 found this review helpful

To be honest, I can't figure out why all the negative reviews. After using the software I'm left wondering if the other complainers actually used it. I'm running WinXP and I didn't have a single installation issue. Regarding Administrator rights, generally the person logged in must have admin rights to install just about any software. Regarding the complaint about saving your file to the disk; turbo tax does initially prompt to save in the program's directory, but this nothing different from the past and you can easily change the folder to any folder you want. Most users (including myself) were very upset about last year Turbo Tax 2002 for the C-Dilla and the activation nonsense. Intuit heard the complaints loud and clear and removed all of this. My experience with TT 2003 has been very pleasant just like all the past versions (minus 2002).


This is my third year with TurboTax   January 23, 2004
book_review_grrl (Raleigh, NC)
16 out of 24 found this review helpful

I absolutely love using TurboTax. The first time I used it, we had moved, sold a house, bought a house, sold stock from an "employee stock plan" - some short term and some long term - and we had state taxes to fill out for 2 states. All this extra stuff inspired me to finally try TurboTax and I loved it. It puts all those tax forms into easy-to-answer questions and really made it go much faster.

Plus, once you've done your federal taxes, if you use TurboTax State you'll be done with the State forms in like 10 minutes. Sure, you might answer a few more questions, but you're really 95% done with the State before you get there! VERY cool! Anything that can get me done with the taxes more quickly is a good thing!

At the end of the process each year, it helps me determine what withholding rates we should use for the coming year to help maximize our paychecks. It was right-on-target (we will get a teeny tiny refund this year) so our money is working for us, instead of us letting the government earn interest on our money.

When you start TurboTax each year, it summarizes all the major changes to the tax laws - so you can quickly see which ones impact your personal situation. This is also a nice feature.

If you have a tax situation that is not very simple, but not really complex enough to warrant using an accountant, try TurboTax. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.


Worked great for me   March 30, 2004
A Happy User (North of KC, MO)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful

Until about 3 years ago, I had always done my taxes manually, with help from Excel. Then I had a paid preparer do it. This year, I decided to spend less than half of what the preparer charges and do it with Turbo Tax Deluxe.

The updates easily downloaded and installed. I entered the data required and I was done. It was the easiest time ever had doing federal and state taxes. Maybe my expectations are lower than other people's, but when I only have to enter income items and allowable expenses to complete an itemized return, that is a breeze in my book. All the data was integrated into the state return and the state taxes were calculated without incident. And Missouri has a mess for a tax system. The calculations are a real challenge, but TT took care of all of that. It was great!

The product certainly seemed to do what it should and I plan to use TT again next year.