Avalara vs. Intuit TurboTax

I find Avalara to work very well if you are using a software system that is integrated with Avalara, and it is set up to calculate the tax and file the returns. It is very streamlined and efficient. It doesn't work as well if the tax is calculated elsewhere and you have Avalara filing your returns; the options for getting the tax info into Avalara are very limited.

Incentivized

Intuit TurboTax is well suited for most scenarios ranging from simple filing (i.e., single filing, one employer, limited asset, same state as employer) to complicated filing (i.e., married filing jointly, changing employers, different state as employers or WFH, multiple assets such as real estate and cryptocurrencies, entrepreneurship side-gig). TurboTax does not have wide-range offerings and partnerships with crypto exchanges so crypto owners may use a different service to generate the necessary tax forms for TurboTax to digest.

Incentivized

• Sales tax rates at a "roof top" level
• Has extensive research and documentation on telecommunications industry
• Research is always up to date
• The ability to ask questions and get clarification on specific situations with no limit as to how you ask a question and often get the answer the same day

Incentivized

• Ease of use
• Availability
• Cost

Incentivized

• Avalara needs to be able to provide tax and legal advice, so we don't have to go to an outside source.
• Some states we file in have more than just sales tax on the return. For example, Washington has B&O tax, tire tax, sales and use tax. It would help a lot if Avalara could report all of these taxes, so we don't have to file manually.

Incentivized

• integration with other applications such as Mint
• online and cloud sign-up for multiple Intuit applications is unsmooth
• price point for state tax filing can be made staggered (cheaper for simple form)

Incentivized

We need their help with filing and keeping track of things. It is very likely we are in the process of renewing right now. Autumn is our case manager and she has been a great help in keeping us updated on our usage and renewal. I feel we will be using this for a very long time.

The UI is simple and straightforward. The site is organized in a manner that is easy to understand for beginners and experts alike. There's also tons of resoruces on Avalara University at your disposal to better understand how Avalara can work best for your business needs. I would recommend Avalara to anyone wanting to investment in the betterment of their business's sales tax function

Incentivized

I have been using Avalara for years and do not remember ever having an outage during working hours. The service is accurate and dependable.

We do have trouble tying Avalara's reporting back to our POS, but we just got a new POS system and there are bugs we are still trying to work out within the POS system. I do not believe this is an Avalara issue

Incentivized

In my experience, numerous questions, and particularly those regarding billing issues are just ignored, and it is impossible to get to someone to discuss. Your account manager will tell you they are taking care of it and then it just goes into a black hole.

I wasn't here when they first started with Avalara.

Incentivized

The documentation online we informative and helpful. The videos from the Avalara institute and the help tab if we have any questions and the search too were helpful. We like the ease of using the click here for more information tool about nexus and the information for the ECM Pro training were helpful. Whenever we have a question we normally get an email along with the tool as to where to find our answer. We also like that it shows information about nexus status of the states we maybe approaching and we can look more into it.

Incentivized

The implementation team from Avalara was very knowledgable and did a good job of passing along information so that we could maintain the system and be able to make future changes ourselves. We had asked for some custom tax setup and they worked with us to get additional taxes set up that they didn't previously have. They worked with us to pull our documentation on tax rules and make sure those were included. I had hoped more scenarios would be there out of the box to cut down on the configuration time.

Incentivized

When I first started my position, we were already in the process of going into Avalara. I am unsure why our previous Controller selected Avalara, but I do believe it was because of the ease of use and aiding with determining nexus in states where we ship our products.

Incentivized

Intuit TurboTax is much simpler and easy to use, not to mention affordable.

Incentivized

There is no change that has to happen as your company grows, Avalara continues to do it's job for any size company

Incentivized

• The ROI with Avalara has been significant. We did not have to hire additional staff to manage sales tax. Before Avalara, when we managed taxes in-house, we constantly received late filing notices and paid related penalties. That all stopped once Avalara took over.

Incentivized