3 Sneaky Things You Didn’t Realize Your Tax Software Was Doing — And How to Stop Them This Year
By Laura Bogart
Taxes are an inevitable part of life. Paying your taxes on time is essential to your overall financial well-being, steering you away from fees, fines and all sorts of legal trouble. Of course, this doesn’t make the process of filling out your taxes any easier.
If you’re one of those people who’s Googling what you can deduct while giving the calculator app on your phone a good workout, you’ve probably tried one of the more popular tax software systems out there. At their best, these programs can make filing your taxes far less stressful. However, at their worst, they can cause you a real headache or lead to real problems in terms of your financial security.
While you’re worried about ensuring that your taxes are accurate and on time, your tax software could be undermining you. Here are a few sneaky misdeeds your tax software could be up to this year — as well as a solid tip for how to prevent them.
1. Selling Your Data
If the sentence, “Your tax software could be selling your data” makes you anxious, you wouldn’t be alone — or wrong. Yet that’s exactly what might be happening, if you use certain mainstream tax filing systems.
Reporting from The Washington Post suggests that some tax-filing software includes privacy prompts that can actually result in anything but privacy. Information from your return, like your income, mortgage details and information about student loans, can be given to outlets that will target you with ads.
So how do you avoid your personal financial information being used to turn your inbox into a billboard?
That’s why we like E-file.com, a tax software that recognizes the importance of real privacy. Not only can E-file.com do exactly what other services do (only more efficiently) but the company actually values its customers’ privacy. Unlike other companies, E-file.com does not sell user information to any third parties.
When you share your information with E-file.com to get started with the process, you can rest assured that everything you add will stay private.
2. Misleading Discounts
Ideally, your tax software would help you save as much money as possible. Unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to be the case for certain companies.
Some mainstream tax software companies come with hidden costs that undermine promises to be a free filing service. You’d fare much better with a service like E-file.com, which has over a decade of service to consumers, providing tax prep software for free to taxpayers who qualify for their basic federal software. At the same time, E-file.com also offers deluxe and premium software that is up to 50% less expensive than its competitors.
E-file.com actively works to find ways to save you more money across the board, with features that ensure you don’t miss out on potential deductions, along with information about tax credits you should know about. Better yet, E-file.com comes with a dedicated support team that can help answer your time- and cost-saving questions often within minutes after you’ve sent that question — even during peak tax season.
3. Not Prioritizing Accuracy
You rely on your tax software to be accurate. If it’s not, you might end up discovering down the line that you paid more than you actually owed. In 2024, about 12,000 Oregonians got this exact unwelcome surprise about their taxes, due to an error in their tax software.
A report from the Oregon Capital Chronicle revealed that an employee with the Oregon Department of Revenue discovered the error, which involved directing users to take the standard deduction, even though itemizing expenses would have lowered their tax bills. The people impacted faced having to file amended returns, potentially waiting up to six months to get their money back.
This is a concern that the millions of taxpayers who trust E-file.com with their tax returns don’t have. Using E-file.com streamlines the tax preparation process, potentially reducing human error on your end.
How to Get Started
Filing electronically with E-file.com is painless, and you’ll get any refunds back quickly, thanks to the electronic filing program with the IRS. You could even get your money delivered straight to your account through direct deposit options.
It’s clear that not all tax software is created equal. E-file.com has built trust with millions of customers thanks to its faster, more secure services that keep your information right where you want it. Ready to file your taxes confidently? It’s easy to get started with E-file.com here.
