- H&R Block has done it again.
You know, this name,
it's a big brand.
And if you are looking
to file your 2020 tax return
with H&R Block, stick around,
we have a complete review and walk through
to see if H&R Block online tax software is right for you.
(slow music)
- Hey guys, it's Justine,
with The College Investor Investing
and Personal Finance For Millennials.
Now we cover the gamut
when it comes to tax software
and of course, you're going to be considering H&R Block.
If you've been around the block,
then you know, this is a big brand
that you wanna pay attention to.
And the first question is,
is it really free?
Can you file your taxes for free using H&R Block?
Okay, so you can file your federal
and state tax returns
if you are filing as a W2 income earner,
you have unemployment income,
social security income.
If you have student loan interests
that you would like to deduct
as well as people with childcare expenses,
any of those options,
if you have any of those options,
then you have the potential to qualify
to file for your federal
and state taxes for free using H&R Block.
The free tier also includes the option for users
to file for their stimulus credit.
If you didn't receive a stimulus check,
then you're able to file
for that credit inside of H&R Block.
One thing to know,
if you contribute to a health savings account,
you won't be able to use the free tier
and you'll have to level up to the deluxe tier.
So what's new in 2021?
H&R Block is coming up
with a Have A Pro Do It Program.
So basically you can upload a virtual shoe box
of all of your tax documents
and then a CPA will go ahead and file those taxes for you.
It's a great way to go contact lists in 2021
and get your taxes filed by a professional.
There's also instructions
on how to file cryptocurrency trades.
And then again,
what's new is the ability
to file for that stimulus tax credit.
So let's go over the pricing plans
and I'll show you the differences between their options.
Okay, so H&R Block has their standard for pricing packages.
The free version,
which I mentioned for W2 income earners.
And then there were a few other situations
where you could file for free,
the student loan interests being probably one of
the biggest features you wanna pay attention to
because a lot of the other big tax software companies,
such as TurboTax does not include student loan interest
in their free version.
So you wanna pay attention to that.
If that's you,
H&R Block would be a really exceptional place to go
for filing for free.
Now, the deluxe edition is usually around $30
if you lock in your pricing in December or January,
you are going to see those prices lower,
including the premium online
and the self-employed online options.
Also, one thing to note,
if you are coming from the college investor community,
you can get 25% off your filing with H&R Block.
So if you sign up for one of these other options,
just know that you can get a discount using our link.
So for HSA contributions,
you'll want to go with the deluxe options.
If you have any outside investing,
the premium online option is going to be your best bet.
And that's $40 currently.
$50 is the original price.
And then you're gonna have to pay
an additional $37 per state filing.
Self-employed is going to be
the most expensive option.
It's regularly $85.
But right now you can lock in your rate
at $68 plus the $37 per state filed.
Okay, so now that you have a good idea
of what pricing package you best fall under,
let's go ahead and do a walkthrough
inside of H&R Blocks tax software
and I'll show you how it works.
So with H&R Block,
you're gonna go ahead and create an account
and fill out your email address and phone number
and a username.
Okay, looks like from last year,
they updated the look and feel of their dashboard.
So, let's see exactly what I need to do,
get started on your taxes,
the big green button.
All right, so it looks like they are giving you
a couple of different options here.
The do it yourself is at $0.
Looks like if you want online assist, it's at 40.
And then if you do the drop-off office
at a safe distance,
okay, so that's new for this year.
Let's go ahead and do the, do it yourself,
which is just that W2.
If you have that earned income tax credit,
the child tax credit,
or if you have student loan interest
that you wanna deduct.
Also remember that the college investor community
gets a 25% discount.
So if you're filing early,
you can take advantage of that
and let's go ahead and file for free.
So this is what the dashboard looks like inside.
And it looks like they're going to provide
some information about the pandemic
in how those stimulus credits work
and affect your 2020 taxes.
So it looks like there's going to be
some little pop-up descriptions for various things,
and this is something that they implemented last year.
So just to know that they are putting
this top of mind for people,
because I think that's going to be a question everybody has,
is really nice to see,
and it looks pretty easy to review.
All right, so I'll go ahead
and keep going through the prompts.
Okay, so once you get inside of the dashboard,
if you are brand new to H&R Block,
then you are going to input
all of your personal information.
And then what I like about how the dashboard is set up
is that you're gonna start with federal
and you are going to put in your income deductions,
credits, taxes, and wrap up.
And then all of that information
that's applicable to your state filing
is going to transfer over to that.
You're gonna see a lot of different softwares,
break it up in this way,
but I like how H&R Block uses these icons.
And then you're also going to see kind of an update
of your federal potential refund as you go.
And then next, you're gonna go into the income section.
And I really like how just simple the user experience is.
There's really not a whole lot of texts going on.
So you can easily just know exactly what you're doing,
which is important when you are doing your own taxes.
And here's where you can add in your W2.
So you can import this
and you can enter it manually.
And this isn't interesting.
It looks like your employer
isn't a partner just yet.
So we couldn't import your info.
Obviously the information that I'm putting in is fake
for the sake of this tutorial,
but it looks like if your company
isn't partnered with H&R Block,
you may have to enter this information manually.
And then you're gonna start filling out exactly
what you see on your W2.
And you're going to wanna pay attention
to making sure you're inputting the numbers correctly,
even just mistyping some of that information
can really change things with your refund.
So let's go ahead and enter in these boxes.
Okay, so once you've entered in everything,
it looks like they are gonna prompt me
with a refund reveal.
And if you have a potential refund,
you're gonna see how that's been updated, cool.
So then click next,
then they're just gonna verify
all of your information with input correctly.
If ever you have a question,
it looks like they have these little pop-up boxes
that you can click on
and then use this little help box
to clarify anything that might be confusing.
And then using this little search tool
to search for specific things.
Now, if you did have any cryptocurrency
or you were a crypto trader,
you wouldn't be eligible for the free edition.
So this would be something
where they're just verifying that you didn't have
any of those outside activities going on.
You'd have to upgrade to their next year.
Okay, so here's the other deductions
that you could take a look at,
that student loan interest is probably something
a lot of you might have as a form.
So make sure you have that 1098E form
before you get started here.
And then any of these other tax situations
or deductions that you could also add in.
So let's say that we had student loan interest
that we wanna deduct.
Okay, so you can see how that would change your refund
if you paid student loan interest in the past year,
that it could increase your refund amount.
Okay, then we're going to get a prompt here
that says the standard deduction is right for us
instead of an itemized.
And I think most people are gonna fall
within that standard deduction category.
And then we'll just keep going through the prompts here.
And then we're gonna move into the credits section.
So this really hasn't taken me that long,
especially if you are a simple W2 earner,
and you may have one or two deductions
that you wanna take advantage of,
H&R Block is pretty simple to navigate.
Okay, this is a section you'll probably
wanna pay attention to
and look at all of your different credits
that you could be eligible for.
So they have these little dropdown arrows,
and you can see exactly what types of credits
are available to you.
Especially if you have kids,
you're gonna wanna pay special attention
to the child independent care expenses,
the child tax credit.
And then if you are a lower income worker,
the earned income credit
is a good form for you to visit.
Okay, then you're gonna go into the tax section,
common taxes penalties and payments you might have.
So if any of these things have happened to you
or that you completed throughout 2020,
you're gonna want to check that box,
but we'll go ahead and click next.
Okay, here's a good prompt from H&R Block
that is going to ask you if you've received
any of these other forms.
And sometimes these forms are delivered
throughout the month of January.
So you wanna pay special attention to that.
And especially if you are receiving
a lot of your tax forms via email, eDelivery,
then you are going to want to go
into each of your accounts,
especially if you have investments
or interests that you've earned from a bank,
which would be this 1099-INT,
you are going to add those forms in there.
And depending on what you have
could bump you out of the free version.
So they're gonna give you a quick summary
of your 2020 federal taxes,
including all of those different adjustments, deductions,
and then your potential refund at the end.
And notice how this changed
when I updated that rebate recovery credit.
You're also going to see that over here
in the left hand menu bar
and a decrease of $1,200
because I received that tax credit.
So let's go ahead and click next.
And then here we go.
They're gonna try to upgrade us here
to H&R Block Plus,
if you wanna keep your information
with them for six years,
free access to your return,
automatic import of your tax data next year,
let's go ahead and click no.
Okay, all right,
so if you are filling out your tax return early,
you're going to run into an issue where your state
isn't ready to accept your return just yet.
But I like that they are going to email.
They'll email you when your state return is available.
So that's nice.
You can click next
and then once you're ready,
you can go through
and start preparing your state return.
Okay, so that's a quick rundown
of what the online tax software edition
of H&R Block looks like,
real simple and easy to use.
The interface is just very simplified,
which I really like,
and the helpful help box has been really nice.
If you had any questions on any of your forms
and that's how you file your 2020 taxes with H&R Block.
H&R Block is good for those who qualify
for the free filing option.
And if you are a gig worker or investor,
you'll probably find some value going
with the premium package.
Now, if you fall within the deluxe tier,
such as you're a W2 earner,
you have student loan interest deductions,
but you also make contributions
to a health savings account.
You might wanna consider else
just because there are cheaper options.
You might wanna take a look at Taxslayer Classic
or FreeTaxUSA for a better bargain,
but you're still gonna have
a really great tax software experience.
Now, if you're a landlord
or you have depreciating assets,
then you might wanna consider TurboTax over H&R Block.
TurboTax just had better options
when it came to depreciation calculators,
and being able to walk landlords
through that very complicated process.
Now, if you're considering all of your options,
when it comes to filing your 2020 taxes online,
be sure to check out all
of our complete tax software reviews
at thecollegeinvestor.com.