Android Tip For April - Taxes
Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 11:59 pm
Here is your Android tip for the month of April. Don't copy your W-2 by hand this year. Download SnapTax instead from TurboTax.
So I saw this in the Android market today. A program called SnapTax. Why they call it SnapTax, and not "TurboTax for Android" is beyond me cause I find it a bit confusing, but whatever.
So you fill out your personal information (the stuff that isn't on your W-2), and then simply take a take a picture of your W-2, and after a short time it analyzes the picture and fills in all the data.
Now I have not completed the process because Wegman's may be the 3rd best place to work in the country, but it isn't because they send out the W-2s quickly... However I did scan my W-2 from last year.
At this point you just confirm all the information it scanned, and presumably just submit it (I didn't want to get to far for the fear of getting stuck with old data - Even though I doubt that would happen).
Frankly the most annoying part of the entire thing was trying to get the picture with decent lighting, although it seems quite robust in taking the picture. Honestly I was sure the picture was going to be to small, and was ready to get annoyed because it was impossible to get a larger picture with out cutting part of it off, but after a minute or two it finished scanning and everything seemed to have been put in correctly.
The obvious downfall is you have to use TurboTax, but I use them anyways so that's a non issue for me.
Frankly having what amounts to a version of Google Goggles for taxes is awesome.
Edit: Apparently it is $14.99, but ease is worth it right? Especially since I always get a refund.
Here is a link to Intuit's blog post about it: http://blog.turbotax.intuit.com/announc ... 52010-1235
(The link is from last year so may be a little out dated)
So I saw this in the Android market today. A program called SnapTax. Why they call it SnapTax, and not "TurboTax for Android" is beyond me cause I find it a bit confusing, but whatever.
So you fill out your personal information (the stuff that isn't on your W-2), and then simply take a take a picture of your W-2, and after a short time it analyzes the picture and fills in all the data.
Now I have not completed the process because Wegman's may be the 3rd best place to work in the country, but it isn't because they send out the W-2s quickly... However I did scan my W-2 from last year.
At this point you just confirm all the information it scanned, and presumably just submit it (I didn't want to get to far for the fear of getting stuck with old data - Even though I doubt that would happen).
Frankly the most annoying part of the entire thing was trying to get the picture with decent lighting, although it seems quite robust in taking the picture. Honestly I was sure the picture was going to be to small, and was ready to get annoyed because it was impossible to get a larger picture with out cutting part of it off, but after a minute or two it finished scanning and everything seemed to have been put in correctly.
The obvious downfall is you have to use TurboTax, but I use them anyways so that's a non issue for me.
Frankly having what amounts to a version of Google Goggles for taxes is awesome.
Edit: Apparently it is $14.99, but ease is worth it right? Especially since I always get a refund.
Here is a link to Intuit's blog post about it: http://blog.turbotax.intuit.com/announc ... 52010-1235
(The link is from last year so may be a little out dated)