Need to switch from H&R Block installed software to [suggestions?] (Do you efile while taking RMDs from an inherited trad IRA that has tax basis?)

For the last twenty years’ tax filings, I’ve used H&R Block’s installed software.  I’ve always been hesitant, provider promises aside, to use a cloud-based solution because where something is sitting in the cloud, it’s sitting waiting to be hacked.

For my 2025 returns, I will be abandoning H&R’s installed application because periodically over the last twenty years for various fact patterns, I would receive a pop-up message insinuating that the return was not capable of being efiled when, in fact, it was H&R that had decided that it didn’t want to provide functionality to efile a return with my return’s parameters.  Such a pop-up would also occur after the application had done its accuracy review, leading one to believe that efiling was just a few more clicks away.  During the process of (allegedly) submitting the efile, the application would then spring the surprise condition upon the user with its instruction to paper file the return, despite the user having paid for e-filing capability and having done all the work to prepare the return in its application.  Mailing my returns using accountable mail (certified with a form of return receipt) cost $23, plus, more frustratingly, my time to go and do so.  And the IRS has still not gotten around to processing my paper-based return.

For tax-year 2023, I needed to file two Form 8606s for one of the taxpayers in our joint return, one for the t/p’s own trad IRA with basis and another for a trad IRA that had been inherited during the year and for which the decedent had basis but for which the decedent had not taken their RMD for that year prior to dying.  It was a no-go with H&R when it brought up an “inconsistency” issue of “You cannot e-file if you are using a separate Form 8606 to calculate the taxable amount of a distribution from an inherited IRA with basis.”  That is untrue based on the incompleteness of its sentence (i.e., one *can* efile such a return; rather, H&R decided not to allow it with *its* software).  The IRS’s xml showing its form/schedule limitations for e-filings reflects that they will accept a total of **25** Form 8606s in an efile ([https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-efile/tax-year-2025-accepted-forms-schedules-individual-tax-returns-extensions.xlsx](https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-efile/tax-year-2025-accepted-forms-schedules-individual-tax-returns-extensions.xlsx)) (row 118 with respect to Form 8606).  Apparently, the IRS decided several years ago that beyond an MJ return with two 8606s for the t/p and spouse, that they’d accept up to another 23 Form 8606s for inherited IRAs of the t/p and spouse (or 24 such forms if only one spouse has an 8606 or it’s a single-status return).

For tax-year 2024, I knew we were getting a pass on a mandatory distribution over the 10-year required nonspousal distro period and figured I’d use H&R again, knowing that beyond 2024 I would need to look for a different efiling provider.  To add insult to injury, when it came time to efile my 2024 returns, H&R pulled another gotcha message when further validating the return after clicking to submit the efiling.  H&R decided that if you input a value in Schedule 1, Part II, Line 24k, they won’t efile your return.  The IRS has no such limitation—either a form or schedule is efileable or it is not.  Can you imagine the chaos if they were to drill down to specific lines of forms/schedules to determine the ability to efile?  Nonetheless, H&R inflicts such chaos on its customers.  If I’d known that H&R would pull this stunt again, I would have selected different software for my 2024 returns.  (I hope that other taxpayers with this situation didn’t follow one of H&R’s suggestions—to remove the deduction and pay more in taxes in order to be able to efile with their application!  I’m not sure how their recommendation ties into their “lowest tax” guarantee.)

Although I haven’t used TurboTax, it appears from looking at message boards that it has a comparable restriction regarding Form 8606s.  So, I’m thinking I may have to migrate to cloud-based software if I want to efile my returns (at least through the end of the inherited-IRA distros, possibly as late as the 10th year of its RMDs in 2033).  This leads me to inquire of the Community, especially for those who have inherited IRAs with tax basis in them, **which software do you recommend under these circumstances?**

Although returns may be paper filed by individuals not using a paid preparer, I believe that the IRS’s level of service to paper-based filers and efilers is two-tiered, with paper-based filers receiving a lower tier of service, and I don’t want to be forced into that camp by a software company not adequately disclosing up front that “if you have xyz fact pattern, we will not efile your return even though the IRS would accept it.”

(I’ve used tax-firm-quality-level software such as CLR’s Fast-Tax and GoSystem, and then Thomson Reuters InSource and OneSourse RS, etc., primarily for corporate returns, but also for individual returns in my previous Big-8/6/5/4 timeframe; however, I don’t believe that such applications are available or cost-effective for do-it-yourself filers who desire to file using sufficiently adequate software.)