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I learned a little while ago that H&R Block makes a substantial amount of its revenue from "refund anticipation loans" (no citation, I couldn't find it here: h
by maxmcd 7y ago
I learned a little while ago that H&R Block makes a substantial amount of its revenue from "refund anticipation loans" (no citation, I couldn't find it here: https://investors.hrblock.com/static-files/4293dedf-951d-4541-b4a8-ac80daded417 https://investors.hrblock.com/static-files/4293dedf-951d-454... maybe my information is overblown).
Is there a reason there isn't a "Robin Hood for Taxes"? A service that makes all of its revenue off of refund anticipation loads and provides all tax services for free to entice customers to join?
Ignoring the problematic conflicts of interest involved in issuing loans it seems like this would align a lot of incentives. The company wants tax filing to be as simple and easy and free as possible, just as long as you do it through them.
- mortgagemonster 7y agoCredit Karma does legitimately free filing
- pnutjam 7y agoI file free with DIY tax (freetax.com). I've been using it for several years, but it's not well advertised.
- Sohcahtoa82 7y agoI prepared my taxes with Credit Karma, then with Turbo Tax, and CK was showing me a significantly higher return that TT. Upon investigating, I found that I had accidentally claimed my mortgage interested deduction twice, and didn't enter my 1099-G from my state tax refund from the previous year. CK makes it too easy to make a mistake. TT is a much more polished product, which makes sense since they've been doing it for decades. I trust TT more than CK. That said, TT doesn't charge you until you file. So I use both, make sure the numbers match, then file with CK for free.
- colejohnson66 7y agoCredit Karma just added free audit defense to their tax prep
- atian 7y agoCredit Karma is legitimately bad software.
- winter_blue 7y agoI'm a big fan of Credit Karma, but one huge stickler I have with them is that they block you if you're in a foreign country. You have to use a VPN. I check my credit reports through them regularly, and I had to use a VPN while traveling. I mean, they're not the only ones who do this. Sprint completely blocks you off, if your IP is from a foreign country. And they seem to be using a system that can detect VPNs, so with popular VPNs, you still can't access sprint.com. Ref: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sprint/comments/aweu0u/cant_access_sprintcom_website_keep_getting_access/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Sprint/comments/aweu0u/cant_access_...
- homero 7y agoCredit karma