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Release Notes for Version 11.01,
released Dec 24, 2008
This release contains our tax update for 2009, the Massachusetts Child
support guidelines for 2009, and a number of other fixes and
enhancements.
1. Version Update. This version updates the software version to
2009, the “Start Year” to 2009, and makes other changes to make this the
first release in 2009.
2. Tax Update. This version updates all of the regularly adjusted
brackets and phase out points with the official numbers for 2009. (The
software projects those numbers throughout the year, and then, at the
end of the year, updates with the actual number, along with projections
for 2010 and following years.) The numbers that are updated include:
• Tax brackets.
• The top income taxable for FICA purposes.
• The standard deduction.
• Thresholds for phase-out of the personal exemption.
• Thresholds for the phaseout of itemized deductions.
• Thresholds relating to the Earned Income Credit.
• Thresholds relating to the Hope and Lifetime Learning credits
• Thresholds relating to the Child Credit
3. 2009 Massachusetts Child Support Guideline. The
commonwealth of Massachusetts has introduced an entirely new Child
support guideline. That computation is included in this release of the
software.
4. PDF Writer Removed. After some reports of problems with our
PDF writer, we removed it from this release. If you had previously
gotten it, it will still be installed on your computer. If you had not
previously gotten it, we will not release it again until we believe we
have corrected the problems that have been reported.
5. Defined Benefit Pension Payments. It is now possible to view
and edit the payments that are made pursuant to a defined benefit
pension. The primary benefit of this capability is to alter the payments
in the first year, where we calculate a start date as of the employee's
birthday, and the start state may be a different date. The screen where
you may edit the payments is contained on a link at the place where you
enter the benefit amount on the Defined Benefit Pension "more info"
screen.
6. Pennsylvania and Florida Child Support. We were calculating
FICA and Medicare taxes incorrectly for Pennsylvania and Florida Child
support guidelines where there were bonuses or deferred compensation
included. We were incorrectly subtracting those numbers from tax subject
to FICA and Medicare.
7. FICA and Medicare taxes. We are now exempting overtime and
bonuses from FICA and Medicare taxes in situations where the highest
wage which is not self-employment income is exempt from FICA and
Medicare. If no wages are entered, overtime and bonuses are considered
subject to FICA and Medicare. Where that wage is subject only to
Medicare, we are subjecting overtime and bonuses only to Medicare. We
are continuing to assume that commissions and tips are always subject to
FICA and Medicare.
8. Recalculation Upon Entry of Child-Support Amounts or Dates.
Now, the software will recalculate whenever you enter a child-support
amount or date. Previously, it was possible to change the child-support
date, and an affidavit, for example, would not update.
9. "Monthly" Figures on the Budget Report. We reverted the
treatment of the "Monthly" style on the Budget Report to be one 12th of
the annual number. We had been using a periodic monthly payment, but the
problem was that if a residence was purchased and sold in the same year,
you could end up with two mortgage payments.
10. Deleted Business. If you deleted a business, it would show up
on the Marital and Separate Property Report as "unallocated." That has
been fixed.
11. Child Tax Credit. If child tax credit was in the range where
it was partially phased out, we were calculating $50 over the actual
amount. That has been fixed.
12. Alimony for Guideline and Affidavit Purposes. If alimony
starts more than 1 year after the current year, it now will NOT be
counted for calculation of child support.
13. Start Year. Starting today, for any file created after
December 15 in a calendar year, the default Start Year will be the next
calendar year.
14. Larger Fonts. The software now supports larger fonts for
screen display. Click Home tab > System Info > Use larger fonts for
screen display.
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