Pension Income Splitting Optimizer

[Ross7]

Hi.

The returns for my wife and I are quite simple. I have noticed what I think may be an anomaly with the software that I can't explain. On the Medical Work Sheet I can put an "X" in the box under my name or my wife's name. I first put the "X" in the box under my name. If I go through all the atomizers under the "tools" tab I get a calculated amount of split income and refund amounts. The Charitable Donations Optimizer say to put them under me, the Medical Expenses Optimizer says to put them under me as well. If I now go to the Medical Work Sheet and change the "X" from my box to my wife's box and do all the atomizers, I get a different result for the calculated split income amount, even though the Charitable Donations Optimizer and the Medical Expenses Optimizer still indicates that they should be put under me. Although the net refund results are drastically different, the overall results are very similar (within $2 in total refund amounts). It is puzzling to me that the Medical Expense Optimizer still optimizes to me and the "X" in the box under my wife in the Medical Work Sheet did not revert back to being in my box. The amount on line 33099 did swap from me to her. Why would the optimizer for Medical Expenses not switch from me to her, or why didn't the software change the "X" in the box on the Medical Work Sheet?

Thank you for any help that you can give.

Ross

[TurboTaxHeba]

I don't know your income to know exactly why the optimizer is claiming the medical expenses under you.

to force the optimizer to change the claimer, you have to do it under the "Medical Expenses Claim" page. When you choose the taxpayer name from this page, it will force the software to put the expenses on his/her return. 

I tried to duplicate your situation, the software behaves as it should if you know where to change the claim. 

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I hope this was helpful 

[cb-h]

I am seeing the same problem with an interaction between the medical expense optimizer and the pension income splitting optimizer.  It is clear that the optimal result (largest refund) in my case is if the spouse that uses the medical expenses is also the spouse whose pension will be split.  However, reversing both to the other spouse gives the exact same refund in my case.  Reversing only one of the two give a sub-optimal result.

Now, given that I can make the two cases give the same total payable and refund, you may ask why I care.  Well, it also has implications for who will get future OAS clawback for example.  As such, it would be nice to be offered a choice.

It seems clear that TurboTax should consider optimizing the pension income splitting at the same time as optimizing the medical expenses.  This would avoid the situation where sub-optimal combinations are considered.