Product Description

Guidance for all your personal tax situations. Federal forms and State forms. Step-by-step interviews guide you through a customized experience relevant to your tax situation. Everything you need to prepare your federal and state taxes in one complete program.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7 in Software
• Brand: H&R Block
• Model: 1336600-09
• Released on: 2009-11-24
• Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows XP, Mac OS X
• Format: CD-ROM
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .25 pounds

Features

• Ideal for homeowners and investors, H&R Block At Home Deluxe includes everything you need to easily complete your federal and state taxes, plus five free federal e-files
• Customized interview process helps you easily complete your federal and state taxes
• Easily import W-2, 1099, and data from last year's return; quickly import data from TaxCut, TurboTax, Quicken, and Microsoft Money software
• Automatically double-checks returns for errors; built-in expertise and audit support with guidance
• Guidance for reporting investments, dividends, home sales, and retirement income; H&R Block DeductionPro software to maximize tax savings from donations

Amazon.com Product Description
H&R Block At Home Deluxe includes everything you need to easily complete your federal and state taxes, plus five free federal e-files. With a new, easy-to-use interface, H&R Block At Home Deluxe searches for hundreds of deductions to get customers the biggest refund.

Everything you need to easily complete your federal and state taxes, plus five free federal e-files. Click to enlarge.

Guidance for reporting investments, dividends, home sales, and retirement income. Click to enlarge.

Ideal for homeowners and investors, the program includes personalized tax guidance and features available only from H&R Block, such as built-in expertise and audit support with guidance, plus an H&R Block enrolled agent to represent customers in the event of an audit.

At Home Deluxe

Investors / Homeowners
The right choice for customers with more complex tax situations to easily complete their federal and state returns. Includes five free federal e-files and built-in expertise available only from H&R Block!

Includes these features:

• Customized interview process to help customers easily complete their federal and state taxes.
  
  
• Five free federal e-files.
  
  
• Personalized tax guidance for popular occupations and specific deductions, plus answers to FAQs.
  
  
• Audit support with guidance, plus an H&R Block enrolled agent to represent you in the event of an audit. Included when you file a federal return.
  
  
• Guidance for reporting investments, dividends, home sales, and retirement income.
  
  
• Advice, tips, and planning tools for the upcoming year.
  
  
• Easily import W-2, 1099, and data from last year's return.
  
  
• Quickly import data from TaxCut, TurboTax, Quicken, Microsoft Money, and H&R Block DeductionPro software.
  
  
• H&R Block DeductionPro software to maximize tax savings from donations.

Compare At Home Editions

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Customer Reviews

The Best Value. Buy in Jan or Feb.
I have used H&R Block's tax software every year since 2004. It's always adequate and slightly annoying. There are always a few poorly worded parts, even though most of it is excellent.

The price trends down over the season. In past years, H&R block has mailed me a rebate coupon in late January, so I could get the deluxe version for between nineteen and twenty four buckss after rebate (on amazon.com). I got no rebate coupon this year, but the amazon price did hit 25 buckss in late January. I do 3 tax returns with it. Good value!

** Update 2-10-2010; I find the 2009 version clearer and cleaner than prior years. Very few annoyances on my moderately complex return. Their privacy policy is hard to view and hard to understand. You can't copy...paste or print the interview screens, which sometimes would be handy. Judging from reviews of the competition (TurboTax), I think H&R Block is the better product, and I don't feel ripped off.

good product at a good price (updated)
(Note: This review also shows up in the reviews for the download version. Don't ask me why Amazon doesn't show the reviews in both places for what's really the same product, with just different delivery mechanisms. I bought the box version, if you want to know.)

This part written Dec 9, 2009 (see updated comments below)

This is of course a preliminary review (written Dec 9 based on use in the last few days). At this time one can't do more than a rough cut estimate of the tax return -- the IRS forms aren't finalized, the state forms aren't available, and of course the various income reports (W2, 1099, etc.) aren't out yet.

I don't have a super complicated tax situation this year: it just requires some things that a good tax program should handle easily. So far this program seems to do just fine. I found it easy to use, and found that imports from Quicken and from TXF files worked without any problems. Schedules A, B, and D worked just fine, and the related screens were easy to use and understand. Excess FICA was calculated correctly, as was the child tax credit. The AMT calculation does of course remain weirdly complicated (once a year I mutter to myself about all politicians in DC), but the program does take care of it with no apparent problems.

I used TaxCut last year -- chose it over TurboTax just because of cost, and was quite satisfied. I'm not convinced this year either that you get value for the extra you pay for TT. (Incidentally, note that if you have investment income you probably need to get TT Premium, so the price would be nearly double that of HRB Deluxe.)

A warning I wrote in my review last year seems worth repeating: Don't expect a tax program to apply tax laws correctly in all circumstances; for anything at all out of the ordinary, make sure you double-check against an IRS guide or another guide like JK Lasser's. The folks who design and write and test the programs make mistakes, too. And for the same reason, give the calculations a sanity check, don't just use the program blindly, or you could get tripped up by a software bug that wasn't caught.

I will update this review in Jan/Feb when I've had a chance to do more with it.

Update Jan 29, 2010:

I have now done a first complete pass on my taxes, based on W2s, 1099s, and some projected 1099s. I also have had an opportunity to use TurboTax Deluxe (I got a free copy, legally), so have been able to compare the two products.

I continue to like HRB Deluxe. It's easy to use, and has been trouble-free. There are a couple of things I particularly like, that might be worth mentioning. (1) They show you when the next update is expected, so you don't waste your time running the update check until there is something. (2) Entering info from interest paying mutual funds that might have muni income (tax-free for Fed) is simple: HRB gives you a simple way to enter the amount that's tax-free in your state, and takes care of it without hassle. TT can also deal with this, but I don't like their way as much (they create a separate 1099 to split the income into two parts).

Interestingly, TTD is also noticeably slower starting up than HRBD. Don't know why.

The one advantage TT does have over HRB is on coverage of automated downloads: TT can download your 1099 info from a larger set of institutions than can HRB. W2 downloads look the same between the two. This does save some time, and could be sufficient to be a decider for some. Not for me.

Problem with State download, inefficient customer service
I've used H&R Block's tax software for the last four years and haven't had a problem until the 2009's version. In general, the software is comparable to others in its simplicity and user-friendliness. This year, I bought the Deluxe Home Edition which comes with a state; however, when I tried downloading my free state program, it was indicated that I had to pay $29.95. To make a long story short, I spent 45 minutes speaking with a customer representative before she finally sent me the state link. I was very disappointed as the person initially told me she could not help me because I did not purchase the software directly from H&R Block. When I asked to speak to the manager, I was put on hold for long periods of time. For an issue that has occurred on multiple occasions (as indicated from these reviews), I was highly disappointed with the length of time it took the representative to come up with a solution. Also, had I not insisted on speaking with a superior (who apparently didn't think my issue was worthy of attention) the representative had originally asked me to go ahead and pay for the state and submit paperwork for a refund. It's odd that the program would encounter such a problem and I am very disappointed with the way the situation was handled.