In this case, it was recently revealed that some of the standard features included with TurboTax Deluxe have been disappeared. As in removed without informing the customer that these features where no longer available. I had just bought TurboTax Deluxe. Neither the box nor the installation process disclosed that Intuit had downgraded TurboTax Deluxe. Today, I received the following notice.
The prostration by Mr. Goodarzi that: "Intuit has a long history of doing right by our customers, ..." is utter bunk. I also note that others have seen this misleading slight of hand. Intuit gets greedy, nearly doubles price of TurboTax. Intuit Strips TurboTax Deluxe of Support for Key Tax Forms.
Even more incredulous is the duplicitous gobbledygook statement that: "Here's why we made the change. Over the years, we have worked hard to make it easy for you to choose the TurboTax product that is right for you and your unique tax situation. We want that choice to be clear and confidence inspiring. However, as new online and mobile technologies emerged, our products, and the tax scope and features they included, began to differ, leading to customer confusion. These differences also impeded our ability to introduce new innovations across our entire product line." Mr. Goodarzi seems to believe that Intuit customers are both confused and stupid.
Mr. Goodarzi goes on to state: "But good intent must be matched with great execution, and that is where we let you down. We have heard from many of you that you were surprised when you discovered the change. No one likes this kind of a surprise, so we are taking immediate action to make things right and help you through this transition year." Obviously the "surprise" was trying to pull a fast one on the customer. Well, there are two simple actions that Intuit could have done that would be customer friendly assuming that Intuit was actually ethical.
- Restore the features that were secretly removed though an on-line update.
- Allow the customer to upgrade to the Premier version for free.
Instead of a simple pro-customer solution Mr. Goodarzi proposes a "bait and switch" style solution where the customer must now pay an additional fee to upgrade to then get $25 back. Intuit apparently has difficulty with the concept of ethical behaviour. Getting your $25 refund. Also review this web-page: More information about the $25 cash back offer. Technologically, both Quicken and TurboTax are excellent products. The problem is that the marketing arm of Intuit is despicable.
Update: I actually ended up getting a $35 dollar refund after complaining that the on-line upgrade cost more than the offered $25 refund. So Intuit gets a +1 positive point. Hopefully, next year there will not be a repeat of this year's snafu.
