matty.hall[at]gmail.com says...

- quote -

If you don't want to file the NJ-2210, then you should file
a paper return.

Without knowing how much the underpayment is, we can't
advise you on whether or not the NJ-2210 is required. There
are several exceptions to the penalty (actually, interest):

1. Pay in more than your liability in the previous year.
2. Owe less than $500 (I think) with the return.
3. Pay in at least 90% of the liability via withholding and
timely estimated tax payments.

Gary

--
E-mail to the above address is rarely read. If you want to
contact me directly, please send an e-mail to: gary at
gdgoodman dot com.

<< -------------------------------------------------> << The Charter and the Guidelines for submitting > << messages to this newsgroup are at www.asktax.org > << ------------------------------------------------->

I'm a resident of New Jersey and pay my taxes there.
However, over the summer I worked for a company in a state
that does not have state income tax. As a result, my W2
from them reflects the appropriate level of federal
withholding, but there is no state withholding.

I filed my taxes through TurboTax.com and for some reason,
they concluded that I needed to file a NJ-2210 (Underpayment
of Estimated Tax by Individuals, Estates or Trusts) which
resulted in a penalty of $17. I don't know why this is, but
I suspect that it has something to do with the fact that my
NJ 1040 lists $0 in box 43 for "Total New Jersey Income Tax
Withheld" since my company is based in and I worked in a
state that doesn't have state income tax, so they didn't
withhold anything.

My federal return was accepted by the IRS, but my state
return (New Jersey) was rejected, with the error message
"Error Code 0396: NJ-1040 Line 50 Amount of Tax you owe
contains Invalid +/or Missing Required Data." My only guess
is that this was due to the issue mentioned above, but I
could be wrong.

So, first and foremost, should I really be paying this
penalty, or does it seem that TurboTax's software is
misinterpreting my situation? Secondly, does anyone know
what the error message I received _actually_ means so that I
can fix my return and have it accepted?

Thanks a lot.
-Matt

<< -------------------------------------------------> << The Charter and the Guidelines for submitting > << messages to this newsgroup are at www.asktax.org > << ------------------------------------------------->