I am using TurboTax Premier 2017 in forms mode to jointly prepare my T1 return and my spouse's T1 return. For 2017, one or more of the optimizers (e.g. Medical, Donation, RRSP) seem to run on any change made to any form, any T-slip, opening my return, etc. This is new and was not the case for all previous years of TurboTax/QuickTax (at least the past 14 years). In previous years all optimizers were available for manual selection - as they should be. This change is highly undesirable and removes one of the important functions of the product - the ability to quantify $ Changes in the Summary sidebar when moving deductions between returns. The automatic running of optimizers results in background changes to the Balance or Refund amounts, with the end result being $0 showing in the Change line in the Summary pane. This is not acceptable and needs to be fixed.
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This is easy to duplicate. Start a blank return with a linked spousal return. Enable the Summary sidebar so that summary amounts are visible for both returns. Add a T4 income slip amount on box 14 of the primary return. Save. Change the T4 slip box 14 amount to a different number. Save. Watch the sidebar summary numbers for both returns alternately move up and down in the background - including the Change amount for the primary return. Once the movement settles down, the Change amount in the sidebar ends up at $0. This is wrong - since the Change amount should be static until you make the next change. I assumed the problem was with the optimizers, but perhaps something else is happening. I reported this via the Quicken/Intuit support line last week (using a shared screen with an agent), and unfortunately they have done nothing to help me so far. That is why I posted on the forum.
The latest version of TurboTax (v00.01.71 build 7005 2018.03.29) partially fixes this problem. Thank you for the improvement in context of T-slip changes. However, the same problem still exists (i.e. Change amount in sidebar settles at $0) when changing the selection of which spouse receives the Medical Expense deduction and the Charitable Donations deduction. This can be easily duplicated by entering medical and donation expenses, then going to the Medical Expenses Worksheet and/or the Charitable Donations form. At the top of either form, there are checkboxes for selecting which spouse receives the tax deduction. If you change the selection on either form, the sidebar amounts initially change, then move up and down, and once settled result in a $0 Change amount. It appears the developers have solved part of the problem related to displaying a $0 Change, but have not solved all cases.