[Publib] RE: tax preparation software

[Christopher F. Bowen]

Depending on how you plant to offer this -- in library or as circulating
software, there are a couple of questions to consider when thinking
about tax preparation programs. For example, my library does not offer
any software on library-owned machines that require a users' personal
information be stored on our computers. I believe that most tax software
creates a fairly large file of personal information. In fact one of the
advantages of such software is that it can look at one's info from last
year, and transfer all the relevant information into the  new tax year's
program. So unless you can set up your system to load the patron info on
removable media (and train the patrons to use it) you may end up with a
large database of your users personal financial information. Perhaps
providing links to Internet-based sites would be a better alternative,
once you verify that the patron data is stored at the site, not on your
pcs. 

The other issue is copyright. We do not circulate software for home use
that is intended to be installed permanently on the user's computer. We
offer circulating software that teaches a user how to use Microsoft
Word, for example. We do not circulate copies of Microsoft Word for
patrons to make illegal copies of. 

Hope this helps.

Christopher Bowen
Downers Grove Public Library 
Downers Grove Illinois

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Message: 4
Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 23:49:35 -0500
From: waywardgirl <waywardgirl at gmail.com>
Subject: [Publib] Tax preparation software
To: publib at webjunction.org
Message-ID:
	<fc939c380601152049x50665e1ei6b3af92d1b9d120d at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Hello.

Do any of you provide access to tax preparation software, such as
Turbotax, to your patrons? Please tell me about your experiences and
give me whatever advice you can. We are considering providing such
software at our library, but quite honestly, we know nothing about it.
Any information would be a great help.

Thank you!