When I did my taxes recently I tried to use Kiplinger’s TaxCut, instead of TurboTax because I was upset with TurboTax for their product activation policy.  I checked out the features on the box for TaxCut and it seemed to compare favorably in that it listed the ability to download my stock trade info and my W2.  Unfortunately, the reality turned out to be less impressive.  It turned out that they didn’t support my company’s W2 download and they only supported about 8 brokerage firms.  It seemed kind of cheesy to me that they couldn’t download data from E*Trade.

So out of frustration after trying to import data via files, I gave up and used TurboTax online.  The TurboTax software worked quite well and included a very useful cost basis calculator (which came in handy with some stock that I sold off as a single lot that was originally bought in three lots).

As part of the Kiplinger TaxCut setup, it asked me to register.  Being suspicious of registration schemes, I always make up a new email address for each company that I do business with online.  It only took a week before I started getting spam at the new address that I used, despite the fact that I opted out of ALL emails from them.  What’s worse, is that they were using an outside agency, so it implies that someone actually had to go to the trouble of pulling the data and sending it to the spamhaus.

They just blew their one and only chance to work with me.  I won’t be buying TaxCut in the future, regardless of whether they fix their import problems.  I’m serious about not wanting any email crap.  I get a bunch of email as it is and I don’t need unsolicited offers crowding out real email.  If I get another spam from them I will redirect the address so that the email is sent to one of their online contact emails (or, if I can find it, to their CEO).