Last Updated January 22, 2009   Product Rating   Lots of helpful explanations and advice Federal e-file included Direct import of income from employers   Sluggish at times State e-file not included ($19.95)

Tax season is almost upon us and to help out, TurboTax Premier 2008 will assist you in filling out your 2008 state and federal income tax returns. It will also help you find where you can get refunds and make sure that your tax return is error free by the time you are ready to file. The program is very wizard based, which helps you along every step of the way and provides a lot of help for each step of the process.

The interface itself has been very well designed and laid out to help make the tax filing process easier, which we could all use. The user interface uses screen real estate very nicely and allows for a lot of user interaction. The interface also looks very updated and up-beat compared to other similar programs, which is always a nice thing. Installation of TurboTax 2008 on any recent computer is fairly quick and straightforward. We will say that due to the program's complex nature, while you are using the program, it may seem sluggish at times due to all the background processing it is doing.

When you first open TurboTax Premier 2008, it will walk you through an introductory tax interview, which asks you basic questions about your tax situation and from there it will tell you the best course of action in terms of what version of the 1040 you need and any additional forms you may need as well. As you start filling out your forms, it will proceed in a wizard process that is very step-by-step and categorical, which makes it very easy. For example, first you fill out your personal information, such as name, address, SSN, etc. and then from there it moves onto categories, such as taxable income, then dependents, deductions, and so on. TurboTax gives you the option of being able to save your current filing and come back to it later exactly where you left off. Each time you come to a new category, it will give you two options, one of which allows you to see a list of all the topics in the category and you can choose which applies to you, or you can let TurboTax guide you through the sections and it will determine what applies to you.

At each question, there's a help button which will provide you with instant help and guidance. Every question has a full explanation of what the field requires and what that information is then used for and how it applies to your tax filing. There are also links to tax tips, videos, and various official IRS online documentation.

To make things really easy when entering income information (W-2's), TurboTax Premier 2008 lets you import income information directly from employers who use ProBusiness, ADP, or Paychex as their paycheck service, which is roughly 60% according to Intuit. If your employer doesn't use one of those services, or if you want to manually input your W-2 information, you can certainly do so. TurboTax makes it very easy as it tells you the box number on your W-2 and where exactly to input that information into the program.

Once you have finished your 2008 tax return, TurboTax will completely check it for any errors and then packages up your return into a nice readable form format. It also gives you useful numbers and information about your tax return as well as making a few recommendations along the way. It will review your income information and determine if you should be taking out more or less money and will show you how much money you could be saving by contributing to an IRA. There's also an audit risk calculator, which shows you what the chances are of you being audited by the IRS and explains why as well.

With TurboTax Premier 2008, a federal e-file is included with the cost of the software, but to e-file for your state tax return, it will cost you an additional $19.95. If you don't want to e-file for your federal and/or your state return, you can also print out your completed forms and send them in yourself.

In summary, we liked TurboTax Premier 2008 very much and would recommend it to anyone who wants that extra guidance in filling out their tax return without paying someone to do it for them. Using a computer program like TurboTax, it error checks your return and it also helps you find deductions that you may not have found had you done your taxes on paper.