TaxAct Holdings, Inc. is an American

tax preparation Tax preparation is the process of preparing Tax return (United States), tax returns, often income tax returns, often for a person other than the taxpayer, and generally for compensation. Tax preparation may be done by the taxpayer with or without t ...

software company based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The company offers its own software package "TaxAct" to individual tax registers, companies and professional affiliates. The company was founded in 1998.

History

TaxAct Holdings, Inc. was founded in 1998 as ''2nd Story Software'' by Lance Dunn, Jerry McConnell, Cammie Greif, and Alan Sperfslage. In 2000, a cloud-based version of TaxAct software was released. In 2004,

TA Associates TA Associates Management, L.P. is an American private equity firm and was one of the early modern-era private equity firms in the United States. The firm leads buyouts and minority recapitalizations of profitable growth companies. TA invests acros ...

, a private equity firm based in Boston, acquired two-thirds of the company for $89 million. In October 2010,

H&R Block H&R Block, Inc., or H&R Block, is an American tax preparation company operating in Canada, the United States, and Australia. The company was founded in 1955 in Kansas City, Missouri, by brothers Henry W. Bloch and Richard Bloch. As of 2018, H&R ...

said it would pay $287.5 million in cash to acquire the parent firm of TaxAct. In May 2011 the

U.S. Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the U.S. government that oversees the domestic enforcement of federal laws and the administration of justice. It is equi ...

attempted to stop the acquisition in an antitrust lawsuit. In November 2011, a federal judge sided with the Justice Department, and both companies mutually terminated the contract. In January 2012, 2nd Story Software was sold to Seattle-based

Blucora Infospace, Inc. was an American company that offered private label search engine, online directory, and provider of metadata feeds. The company's flagship metasearch site was Dogpile and its other notable consumer brands were WebCrawler and Me ...

(formerly Infospace, Inc.) for more than $287 million. In 2013, the name was officially changed to TaxAct Holdings, Inc. Subsequently, in October of the same year, TaxAct acquired Balance Financial, the company that specializes in personal finance tools and services. In 2018, former Intuit executive Curtis Campbell was appointed as the President of the company. TaxAct is a member of the

Free File Alliance The Free File Alliance is a group of tax preparation companies which operate a public-private partnership with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to provide free IRS e-file, electronic tax filing services under the IRS Free File, Free File program ...

, a free federal tax preparation and electronic filing program for eligible individual taxpayers developed through a partnership between the IRS and a group of private sector tax software companies. In November 2022, private equity firm

Cinven Cinven Limited is a global private equity firm founded in 1977, with offices in nine international locations in Guernsey, London, New York, Paris, Frankfurt, Milan, Luxembourg, Madrid, and Hong Kong that acquires Europe and United States–bas ...

agreed to acquire TaxAct for about $720 million. Cinven announced it would combine TaxAct's business with Drake Software, which it acquired the previous year, under a single holding company.

Product overview

TaxAct offers tax preparation software for individuals, small businesses, and tax professionals. They offer both online and download products, and have a mobile app available for iOS and Android. There are several online plans: Free, Deluxe, Premier, Self- Employed, Business, and Pro. TaxAct offers a free federal version for basic returns. In March 2018 TaxAct Online Freelancer Edition was awarded the title of "The best tax software for independent contractors" by

Business Insider ''Business Insider'' (stylized in all caps: BUSINESS INSIDER; known from 2021 to 2023 as INSIDER) is a New York City–based multinational financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Inside ...

References

{{Reflist

External links

Official website

TaxAct IRS Free File Program
Financial services companies established in 1998 Tax software of the United States 2012 mergers and acquisitions American corporate subsidiaries 2022 mergers and acquisitions