<p>Cobrat…you can complete the state forms and print them out to mail for free. You cannot EFILE them for free.</p>
<p>Before You Begin </p>
<p>Before you begin your 2012 Massachusetts Personal Income Tax Return, you must determine whether you are eligible to file your return using WebFile for Income.</p>
<p>If you answer YES to any question, you are NOT ELIGIBLE to file your return using WebFile for Income.</p>
<p>Were you a resident anywhere other than Massachusetts in 2012?</p>
<p>Yes No</p>
<p>Are you reporting any capital gains on Installment Sales that occurred between January 1, 1996 through December 31, 2002 (Schedule D-IS)?<br>
Yes No</p>
<p>Are you eligible to claim the Brownfields Credit or the Economic Opportunity Area Credit?<br>
Yes No</p>
<p><a href=“https://wfb.dor.state.ma.us/Income12/EligibleToFile.aspx[/url]”>https://wfb.dor.state.ma.us/Income12/EligibleToFile.aspx</a></p>
<p>Thumper,</p>
<p>While some states won’t allow free efiling, others like NY allow it. </p>
<p>Not only is efiling free in NY state, but as of last year it has become the preferred default by NY state tax authorities.</p>
<p>A couple of years ago when I was helping kids file their returns using the Freefile link on the IRS website, Michigan charged to efile, so we printed it out and mailed it in. Starting last year, assuming you met eligibility rules, you could also efile the Michigan return for free. Michigan not only encourages efiling, they require it if you’re using a paid tax preparer. If you haven’t tried it recently, you may want to try the link on the IRS website again: [Internal</a> Revenue Service](<a href=“http://www.irs.gov%5DInternal”>http://www.irs.gov) and go to Free File. You can either choose a company or answer questions that will suggest one for you.</p>
<p>Yes…Cobrat…SOME states participate in the free file thing. Others do NOT. </p>
<p>When someone free file using the IRS link for doing so, they can find out if THEIR state does free efile. I know ours does NOT…even though their preferred method of filing is online. In fact, they don’t even mail forms to taxpayers anymore.</p>
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<p>In that case, one can go back to what my friends did. Print out the state forms and then mail them out/drop them off at their nearest state tax authority’s office. </p>
<p>If one doesn’t have a printer handy, the online applications also enabled saving the completed tax forms in PDF format so one can email it to themselves/place it on a USB accessible flashdrive and print it from another location.</p>
<p>In MA’s case, their software didn’t do the form for you if you had special items in your return as we did. We found a provider that would do the form but they wouldn’t let you efile or print without a payment. So I just copied the information down onto paper forms and mailed them in.</p>
<p>My personal feeling is that taxation agencies should pay for tax software (no, not as a deduction). Legislatures have made the tax code so complex that it is difficult to do a return without software so legislatures should either provide the software or pay for it.</p>