Texas secures $14M of $141M Intuit settlement over TurboTax ads

NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) - Intuit, the company behind the TurboTax tax-filing program, has been ordered to pay $141 million to customers who were deceived by misleading promises of free tax-filing services. On Wednesday the Texas Attorney General announced that those wronged in the Lone Star State would get $14 million of that settlement.

The statement said, in part, "Nearly 500,000 Texans will benefit from the settlement, whom Intuit misled into purchasing its tax products when they were already eligible to file their taxes for free. Eligible Texas consumers should begin receiving their restitution payments within the next few months."

Under the terms of a settlement signed by the attorneys general of all 50 states, California-based Intuit Inc. will halt TurboTax's "free, free, free" ad campaign and pay restitution to some 4.4 million taxpayers.

New York Attorney General Letitia James said her investigation into Intuit was prompted by a 2019 ProPublica report that found the company used deceptive tactics to steer low-income tax filers away from the federally supported free services for which they qualified and toward its own commercial products.

In a blog pot Wednesday, representatives for Intuit said as a part of the agreement the company admitted no wrongdoing and said the company had agreed to the settlement to, "...  put this matter behind it, and made certain commitments regarding its advertising practices. Intuit already adheres to most of these advertising practices and expects minimal impact to its business from implementing the remaining changes going forward."

Under the agreement, filers who used TurboTax's Free Edition for tax years 2016 through 2018 will receive approximately $30 for each year they were charged when they should have been able to use the IRS Free File program.