Turbo Tax is free, until it isn't

The YouTube comment posters really love this commercial- they love bleating "free," they like brownnosing all over TurboTax, and one even says that he loves the ad so much he'd buy the service except it's free.  Uh huh.

Here's the thing.  I've been a TurboTax customer for nine years.  I find the service extremely easy to use- possibly because I don't own anything and work with only two W2 forms- and generally am able to complete my Federal and State returns, pay the fees, and e-file in about half an hour.  I have never had a problem with any returns completed with the TurboTax program, and usually get emails confirming acceptance of them by the Feds and State authorities inside of 48 hours.  I've never waited longer than two weeks for my refunds to be direct deposited.  Yes, the service works.

But...note that I included "pay the fees" in describing my experience with TurboTax.  TurboTax is NOT, for all practical purposes, "free" in any way, shape or form.  On average I end up paying about sixty dollars to e-file my returns, and that's after refusing to upgrade to the "Deluxe" version which is totally unnecessary because, as I stated above, I don't own anything.  Meanwhile, I get the same "File For Free" message on the website which remains there right up to the moment I start filling out the little boxes.

Here's how it works.  TurboTax typically offers free filing of your state return, IF you pay for filing your federal return at the same time.  So it's "free" in the same way a soda is free, just pay for the can before you open it.  Here's a tip- if you end up taking out your credit card and giving your number to a company that asks you for sixty dollars to finish completing and filing your "free" returns, the program wasn't free.   If you get to a page where you get two choices- the "standard" filing assistance for $49.95 or the "deluxe" version for $79.95, the program isn't free.  If you are "offered" the opportunity to have the cost of the filing subtracted from your refund "for a small extra fee," THE PROGRAM ISN'T FREE.

Now, I haven't researched this fully, so it's entirely possible that there is a way to get TurboTax to do your returns for free.  I suspect that it would involve printing all the completed documents up yourself, sticking them into an envelope, and sending them to the IRS, and come with all kinds of disclaimers concerning how TurboTax is not responsible in any way for delays in the Feds or the State officials getting your returns or you getting your refund.  I suspect that the "free" version comes with zero support and is covered with warnings that if you take the "free" option you are setting yourself up for disaster Better Click That $39.95 Button At The Very Least.  Far more likely, the "free" claim references nothing more than the Free If You Pay For This deal I mentioned in the previous paragraph.

Oh, guess what- I decided to check on the "free" claim at the TurboTax website.  Turns out that you CAN get a free filing using TurboTax IF your filing fits these categories:

• W-2 income
• Limited interest and dividend income reported on a 1099-INT or 1099-DIV
• Claim the standard deduction
• Earned Income Tax Credit (EIC)
• Child tax credits

I was quite correct in my prediction that using the free option means that you get no support from TurboTax if something goes wrong.  Nor do you have your documents stored in a safe place electronically unless you do that yourself.  So while you CAN technically file for free using TurboTax, it's a pretty bad idea.

Again- I use TurboTax. I LIKE TurboTax.  It works really, really well.  But the safe version is NOT  free.  Non-buyer beware.

Tom Brady's always too busy to do stuff like this

Heart-warming to know that Aaron Rodgers has a solid insurance policy on that palace he'll be living in with his one Superbowl ring after he's finally given his walking papers by Green Bay, isn't it?

University of Phoenix: It says University in the name, so.....

Larry Fitzgerald promised his mom that when his playing career was over, he'd finish college- is that what I was supposed to get out of this?

And then his mom died, but Larry Fitzgerald didn't forget his promise.  He decided to go back to school.  Well, that's sweet and nice and all that.

But then, Larry Fitzgerald decided that instead of finishing college, he'd get a worthless piece of paper from a for-profit diploma mill Not-University, the "University" of Phoenix.  I'm not at all sure that's what your mom had in mind, Larry.

But check out the YouTube comments- the heart-strings have been tugged and the tears are flowing, allegedly.  None of these people have watched the documentary Fail State, obviously.  I suggest they do.  I also suggest that all you idiots claiming that John McCain was a brave, patriotic, caring American icon watch it too- and then you can explain to me why Mr. Maverick wouldn't even listen to testimony concerning the University of Phoenix and other institutions that rip off students and taxpayers but instead stalked out of the committeeroom in a huff after accusing Senator Tom Harkin of being "against profit."

Good luck with that communications "degree," Larry.  I hope it at least came with a fancy frame and maybe a set of Ginzu knives.  You should get SOMETHING of value out of all that money.

The Pro Bowl: Television's annual celebration of celebrations

No, you didn't see Tom Brady at the Pro Bowl last year.  You haven't seen Tom Brady in the Pro Bowl any year, because a few decades ago they changed the Pro Bowl from the week after the Superbowl to the week before, and Tom Brady is too busy getting ready for the Superbowl to be in a stupid, meaningless All-Star Game where the only drama involves the constant possibility that someone's career is going to be ended by an injury occurring in a stupid, pointless, meaningless All-Star Game.

And you won't even see most of the best players in the NFL in the All-Star Game, because they've just finished their season with a playoff loss and want to start their brief vacations before tryouts start up again.  Plus there's that getting injured in a stupid, pointless, meaningless All-Star Game again.

But there IS a bit of honesty in this commercial, and all commercials for the Pro Bowl:  Pretty much all of the highlights will involve players posing, primping, and posturing for the camera whenever they do pretty much anything at all.  You know, just like every other NFL game during the regular season and the playoffs.  They just won't be the BEST players.  But if you just can't deal with a week without watching grown men flex their muscles and jump around to draw attention to the fact that they just did something they are paid to do, there's the Pro Bowl.  Enjoy.  I'll be doing something else.  ANYTHING else.

Open question for Nissan and Verizon

Can you guys explain to me why you think that greasy Eurotrash creeps in tight pants are the best possible spokeschoads for your product?  All together or one at a time, either way, fine with me.

Because, seriously- these look exactly like the kind of people I would warn children to stay away from, and if either suddenly jumped at me to start pitching a product they wouldn't get halfway through the first sentence before I gave them a faceful of mace, or fist, or whichever was most available.

Hey, Toyota? More is NOT better

So much worse than pretty much anything else on television....

Seriously, Toyota, here's a New Year's Resolution for you:  find another spokeschoad.  A decade of this woman's face and chirpy voice and ridiculous enthusiasm for peddling Japanese automobiles to the middle class is more than enough (here's something unintentionally funny:  her IMDb page lists her filmography and notes at the bottom that she's "also known as Toyota Jan." Um, no- she's known as Toyota Jan, and look she's been in other stuff, too.  And now that she's been done to death by Toyota, she's beyond typecast and will never get a serious acting gig ever again.  See Progressive, Flo From.)

These days we're supposed to pretend she's pregnant for some reason, like she's become part of our family because she invades our living room via TV 300 times during every football game.  Well, here's one blogger who doesn't find her charming or interesting or funny or even an effective salesmonkey as she gushes nonstop and never takes that stupid freaking smile off her intensely punchable face just because she keeps showing up.  I just want her to go away already.  Can we get this done in the New Year?  I mean, she's got a kid to take care of, right?

*by the way, check out the genius in the comment section who was reminded of the opening of The Brady Bunch.  Nothing gets by some people!

The Release of E.T.- a "just for fun" look back at the golden age of VHS

From the spring of 1987 (a few months before I graduated from college) to the spring of 1991 (when I was in the process of finishing up my Master's Degree and preparing to move to New York with my fiancee) I worked for a video rental store chain in the DC/Northern Virginia region.  I started out as a part-timer and ended up managing several stores, making enough money to pay my tuition, take girls out to dinner, and generally have the kind of fun you are supposed to have when you're in your mid-twenties and getting ready to start Real Life.

E.T. - The Extra Terrestrial was released on VHS in October 1988, a month after I had started grad school and right after I had been bumped up to Assistant Manager at The Video Place's hole in the wall store in the underground mall at Crystal City, Virginia.  I can remember taking multiple pre-orders every day for months beforehand, taking down deposits of 50% for the $24.95 tape (minus the $5 Pepsi promotion) and answering one "is it there yet" call after another (nobody seemed to quite understand what the term "release date" meant, and in the pre-Google age nobody seemed to know how to find it anyway.)

There were a lot of big films released on VHS while I worked at The Video Place- An American Tail, Lady and the Tramp, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Rocky Horror Picture Show where probably the biggest, but I can also remember selling Janet Jackson and Phil Collins and Tears for Fears concert compilations at a pretty quick clip.  I wonder if they are still collecting dust somewhere.  But I don't think we ever experienced anything from our customers that approached the excitement of the E.T. video release.  It was even bigger than the rush to grab a copy of Legend of Zelda they were experiencing across the hall at Waxie-Maxies.  I think we sold about 300 pre-order and hundreds more off the shelf before that Christmas.  I still have a copy lying around somewhere, I'm sure.

Anyway, like all Golden Ages, this one didn't last forever, and The Video Place didn't long survive my departure- in fact, three of the four stores in the chain had been closed before I left, and the final one shut down before the end of 1991.  I spent most of my last months with the company going from store to store organizing close-out sales- I've mentioned before at this site that when I closed one store there was exactly ONE unsold VHS tape on the shelf- Satisfaction, "starring" Justine Bateman but including Liam Neeson and Julia Roberts.  I didn't know it then, but the rental industry had passed its peak and the internet was looming on the horizon.

Thirty years after it's release, E.T. is still a solid seller on Amazon (I don't know how well An American Tail aged) and a generation is growing up less susceptible to the charms of the brick and mortar store, so I guess the idea of a place where you could go and browse movie titles on the shelf is going to sound more and more alien as the years go by.  For us, it's still a loss, just one that's going to be harder to describe and explain to the next generation.  I like to remind myself of those days anyway.