TurboTax Responds

As I mentioned, my TurboTax posts brought in more feedback than most other articles I’ve posted. Beyond casual readers, I also received a response from none other than a TurboTax VP, Bob Meighan. His initial response was as follows:

“We do listen to the feedback from our customers from as many sites as we can. And while we do try to support as many platforms, operating systems and browswers as possible, it becomes exponentially more difficult coding and testing all the variations… especially in a very seasonal business as tax. The permutations of what needs to be tested gets crazy.

“We do understand the desire to be available to everyone in every different format needed, but the reality is we have to prioritize to meet the needs of as many users as possible.

“We embrace Linux, Firefox and other alternatives to mainstream apps (yes, even on our own desktops) and will work to ensure TurboTax and our web sites support them as well.

“I hope this information helps.”

I was glad he took the time to respond. We had another quick back-and-forth, much of which I’ve already covered in my other post and my post on the TurboTax support forum, except that I added I thought it odd that Firefox would be supported on Windows but not Linux, and how in my experience the engines and rendering should be the same except for some cosmetic details such as font sizes. Further, I wondered why the script would explicitly lock out Linux and Unix users.

Bob admitted he didn’t have a definite answer to that, and that it was essentially an engineering decision. They can’t test every permutation of Linux out there (one of the disadvantages of having so many distros and desktops, I have to admit), so they can’t expect their people to provide support on each.

My first reaction was to suggest what many software developers do: tell folks what distros they’ve managed to test the software with, and leave the rest to the user. But in thinking about it, that’s always been Open Source software. Lawyers and corporate engineers may not be as willing to make a comment or commitment like that.

Regardless, the solution to use their web-based software is out there if we’re willing to take a crack at it. Also, Linux is gaining more ground on the desktop, and as both Shawna (on the forum) and Bob mentioned, Intuit is using Linux in their enterprise. By my thinking, that suggests we’re getting closer. Perhaps it’s only a matter of time now before we start seeing official support.

In the meantime, be sure to keep sending feedback their way; they’re listening.