It appears that in QB Self-Employed, that the home use calculation automatically defaults to the $1,500 deduction without taking into account actual profit/loss

Thank you Jen.  This will help when my client has a question about the amount if they ever compare it to their actual tax return.

You're welcome, @james2.

It's my pleasure to help. If you have other questions in mind, please drop another comment below or mention me on your posts.

The Community doors is always open and I'm here to lend a hand at any time. Wishing you continued success on all future endeavors. All the best!

The "regular method" will not update. QBSE keeps defaulting to the simplified method even if you totally remove Home Office option and then try to update it to regular method.

QBSE will not accept regular method and keeps defaulting to simplified method. The entire reason I am paying $17.00 per month for this functionality. 

Good morning, @vbpets. 

Thanks for reaching out to us here in the Community. 

I recommend contacting our support team as they have the tools available that can pull your account in a secure environment to investigate this issue and its odd behavior. I've posted the steps to contact support below. 

On a web browser:

1. Select Assistant from the top bar. 
2. Type "Talk to a human".
3. Then choose your preferred support method: Message an agent, Call an agent or Get a callback. 

If you have further questions or concerns, don't hesitate to let me know. You can reach back out to us here in the Community any time you find you need a helping hand. Take care and have a good one! 

was this solved? mine defaults to simplified as well and i want to do regular home office deductions.

Hi, @fiona10.

I appreciate you for following up with us here on the Community page.

As mentioned by Jen_D above, the system estimates your quarterly tax payments using the simplified method. But with larger expenses, the regular method is best for annual taxes. Claiming your home office deduction using the regular method doesn’t stop at the home itself. You can use your business use calculation to determine how much of the following can be deducted for business use as well:

• Mortgage (or rent) payment
• Utility costs
• Homeowners (or renters) insurance premiums

Thus, I recommend reviewing your home office categories to check for your expenses. 

Deciding between these methods when claiming the home office deduction is tricky. You need to think about the size of your home office and the calculations you want to make. For some small business owners, the difference in the deduction isn’t worth the extra paperwork and record-keeping that comes with the regular method.

If your home office is small, you’ll likely benefit from the simplified method. The calculations are less complex, and you’re likely to see a slightly larger deduction by claiming $5 per square foot.

I'm adding these links for more resources about home office deduction:

• Overview of the home office deduction
• ​​​​​​No place like home: Understanding your home office deduction
• The (Almost) Ultimate Guide to Self-Employed Expenses and Tax Deductions

Moreover, here's an article you can open to know more about the updates to expenses categories in QuickBooks Self-Employed.

If you have any other questions about home office deductions, please let me know by adding a comment below. I'm always here to help. Have a good one!

Thanks for the quick reply. I understand the difference and want to use the regular method. How do I set that preference? The program is defaulting to standard and won’t let me change it to regular. How do I do this? 

I understand the difference and want to use the regular method – not the simplified method. The program is defaulting to simplified method and won’t let me change it. How do I set it to calculate the regular method?

Hello, Fiona. I can help share additional information regarding the deduction method in QuickBooks-Self Employed.

QBSE uses the simplified deduction method in calculating your federal estimated quarterly tax payments.

You may consider seeking expert advice from a tax pro. They can advise which method suits your business. To learn more about each deduction method, you can visit the IRS website.

I am also adding this article that contains more details about tracking home office deductions in QuickBooks Self-Employed.

As always, you can post anytime here for any additional concerns.

Yes. As I said, I understand the difference in how to calculate and want the regular deductions. The program itself does not allow me to choose regular and instead defaults and gets stuck on simplified. I am not asking about it the difference in regular vs simplified. I am asking how to get QBSE to go with regular deductions for home office. 

Unfortunately, this issue if NOT 'solved' or resolved. The bug is still present and is not allowing us to use the regular method for calculating actual (not estimated) home office deductions for annual taxes. To reiterate:

- We already know which option to choose between regular and simplified.

- We have decided on regular but QBSE is not cooperating

- We have asked the problem be fixed and continue to get unhelpful answers to a question we didn't ask.

Read carefully. The issue is that QBSE is not calculating the regular method for home office deductions. The whole point of using software like this is to simplify the process of filing taxes. However, this glitch prevents just that. Therefore, you should fix it or return a portion of our subscription costs.

David

Was anyone able to resolve this issue?

Mine is also defaulting to the simplified method, when the regular method is substantially more beneficial to my deductions.

Thanks for joining this discussion and sharing your experience with the home office deduction calculation, @ef85,

To help you further with this, the system determines the method to be applied based on how you categorize your transactions. I have found a related link with my colleague's explanation on how to make sure your entries are calculated using the Regular Method.

Open this link for the detailed answer: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/reports-and-accounting/how-do-i-get-quicken-se-to-...

Post here again if there's anything else I can help you. I'll be right here to assist your with this QBSE concern anytime. Have a good one!

This problem seems to have been going on for at least 3 years now according to this thread...why is it so hard to resolve? System gives you the choice standard or regular but no matter which you choose it defaults back to standard. 

This isn't the experience we want you to have, Pappysjnt.

I understand the importance of using the regular method to calculate your taxes. The QuickBooks Self-Employed program uses the simplified method to calculate your estimated taxes. There's nothing wrong with the system since it works as designed.

The software gives you options for the simplified or regular method to know the estimated deduction based on your preferred calculation. However, saving it won't change the default computation.

For more information about our QuickBooks Self-Employed taxes, you might want to read this article:

• Pay federal estimated quarterly taxes in QuickBooks Self-Employed
• Get quarterly and annual tax info from QuickBooks Self-Employed

In addition, I've added this helpful material for a complete guide in categorizing your transactions to put them in the correct line of your Schedule C report: Schedule C and expense categories in QuickBooks Self-Employed.

Don't hesitate to add any details if you have further questions or concerns. We're always here to help you.

I am the original poster who defined this problem a couple replies down from the OP.

Because they're too lazy to consider what is obviously a system change or in the very least a change to the SCREEN and functions. That's why all these people are giving double talk.

"This is not the experience we want you to have" "there's no glitch" translates to "stop doing it and expecting it to perform the way the screen says and the way the user REQUIRES [for $17.00 per month].

I unsubscribed from QBSE after this mess in 2020. I have to keep my own records anyway (same thing with mileage deductions have to be contemporaneous 100% documented) and I just use Dave Ramsey's tax program taxslayer to file.

Exactly this.

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@Jen_D wrote:

Thanks for joining this discussion and sharing your experience with the home office deduction calculation, @ef85,

 

To help you further with this, the system determines the method to be applied based on how you categorize your transactions. I have found a related link with my colleague's explanation on how to make sure your entries are calculated using the Regular Method.

 

Open this link for the detailed answer: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/reports-and-accounting/how-do-i-get-quicken-se-to-...

 

Post here again if there's anything else I can help you. I'll be right here to assist your with this QBSE concern anytime. Have a good one!

---

Lol BOT giving useless repetitive non sequitur "replies". 

I also have the issue where QBSE will not apply the "regular" method for home office expense deduction. It's a terrible user experience / bad design. 

But.... I did find a somewhat conclusive answer. The simplified vs regular deductions are not meant to auto adjust monthly tax estimates. You use the method you want manually at the end of the year during tax time. See this response for further explanation. 

So when you are paying mortgage you can set it as home office but does it calculate the simplified ?  Can it be adjusted to standard calculations?

Mine defaults to that as well. 

I understand the importance of ensuring that you'll get the right deductions,  DaPepU2. I'm here to share insights about this. 

QuickBooks Self-Employed (QBSE) utilizes the simplified deduction method to calculate quarterly estimated tax payments.  For more information, refer to this article: Track home office deductions in QuickBooks Self-Employed.

You can read through these articles to help you manage your home office-related transactions:

• Schedule C: Home office expenses
• No place like home: Understanding your home office deduction

Keep your post coming if you need further assistance in managing your home office-related transactions. I'm always here to help. Have a good one.