Take a Tax Class?

I had married on the last business day of the the previous year. I had a very small cosmetics business and my new husband had a partnership and a handful of other miscellaneous activities.  I gathered all of my tax information so he could take it to his “tax” guy.

Harmless enough.  After all, I didn’t know anything about taxes.  I assumed we would have to file jointly but wasn’t sure about that.  Needless to say, when the return came back to me, I didn’t recognize much of what was on it and was left with more questions than answers.  That’s when I decided to find a solution for next year.

Pen & Paper?

I signed up for a course at the H&R Block Income Tax School in the fall 1985 to prepare for the 1985 tax year. These first tax returns were done with  pencil and paper for the draft,  do all of the checking with an adding machine and printout,  re-write it in pen, then put it in the mail.  I had worked in a large retail chain cash office and your adding machine and tape were your best friend.  I still have to have a calculator that functions like an adding machine and prints on paper.

Do you remember DOS?

After taking the class, I decided it was something I could do and make a few bucks. No plans to do difficult returns, just the simple ones.  This wasn’t my full time job.  My full time job was  running the POS Help Desk Call Center at a large retail chain.  I worked with computers and had purchased a Tandy 1000 Series to be able to work at home and write documentation.  Complete with a 5.25″ floppy drive, printer, and monitor.

1986 Changed the World

Then came the 1986 Tax Reform Act.  No more pencil and paper for me, I had to find a way to simplify this task if I was going to go forward.  I had met a CPA who used Turbo Tax for the computer!  What a great idea!

I still had to do the Oklahoma returns by hand but that was okay.  I continued to use Turbo Tax Professional until tax year 2008.  I don’t do many returns, mostly referrals and my ongoing clients so the cost of software continued to climb and you paid extra for states, e-file, you name it.  Everything added to the cost of doing a tax return and my rates were very very low anyway.  I went from full version to pay-per-return.

Let Down by Another

Somewhere around 2003, I was called by a potential promotional product client (my primary business today) who happened to be a tax preparer who used Drake.  At that time, I was not unhappy with Turbo Tax so I promised her that if I ever decided to change I would give her a call.  That happened in 2008.

I called my current provider to discuss alternatives because I didn’t want to change. Changing means transferring data, verification that everything came across, learning a new process…  I am a loyal customer but the large corporate environment there didn’t really work for me so, as promised,  I made the call to the Drake rep.

Saved by Drake

Drake came as a package with everything I needed and more.  There was a learning curve but nothing major and they had tools to make the transition.  And, for the first time in all of these years, I had a problem and I just couldn’t figure out why the numbers weren’t flowing the way they should.  I called Drake support and the young man (he sounded young anyway) patiently assisted me and graciously showed me the problem (I was the problem.)  It wasn’t a software problem and it was working exactly as it should, I was just couldn’t “see the forest for the trees” in my brain.  His kind assistance made my day better because now I was able to step back and laugh at myself and the situation.

Guess what?  My old provider wants me back.  Imagine that?

Don’t misunderstand.  Turbo Tax has a great product, it simply no longer worked for me.  They did introduce an online option this year which I considered but Drake offered a better, less expensive option for me and I wouldn’t have to convert all of my returns back.

Happy Tax Filing!