Favorite Four - Getting your Taxes Done
The only two things which are certain are death and taxes. Well, we've covered the former extensively, so here come the taxes. Especially since this week (in the US, anyway) is the deadline for filing yours! So I present to you our favorite apps for helping you out in the otherwise treacherous waters of Income Tax Filing.
TurboTax SnapTax
Quite possibly the simplest, easiest and hassle-free way to file your taxes. I have rarely seen an app get such uniformly positive reviews on the App Store. You know you're living in the future when you can take a photo of your W2 and practically everything is taken care of for you. There's no need to manually enter your income information, just answer a few basic questions and you can file right from within the app. While the app is free, you will need to pay $19.99 to process and file, which personally seems like a bargain considering the minimal effort involved.
A great choice for most, but not everyone, read the caveats included on the iTunes descriptions page to make sure this is right for you, if not, you could also check out the TurboTax iPad app which offers more options.
H&R Block Tax Central
If you're looking for something more along the lines of a general guide to tax preparation than I suggest the H&R Block app. It offers a great sort of FAQ and guide to filling out your forms. It also includes a checklist to make sure you have all of your required paperwork, or estimate what your return might be. It's geared towards getting you into H&R Block, so you'll also be able to search for nearby offices. While acting more as an overall guide, it's still very useful and handy information to have around, especially since most of the information is available offline.
IRS Regulations (Title 26 Code of Federal Regulations - Internal Revenue)
A serious title for a seriously hefty app. While I realize that most people won't need a copy of this hefty tome, I'm certain that those who do would very much appreciate the work put into this app, and making the entire Code (all 39.4 MB of it) available on their iPhone or iPad with full search integration. It also offers highlighting, bookmarking and sharing via email of any section of the code. While there are several similar apps available, this one really seems to offer the best user interactivity. Most importantly, it's the most recently updated for this tax season.
MyTaxRefund
Perhaps you've not procrastinated your way through April, and actually got your filing done already. If you've E-Filed than you simply have to get MyTaxRefund to track your refund. It'll update for the status of your return, alert you if for any reason it was rejected, and best of all it will estimate the time that your return will be back to you. It's simple, it's free, but it works.
I didn't want to include two apps from the same developer, but I simply couldn't overlook this. TurboTax is doing a phenomenal job in taking on the app world for tax season.