Taxes- Turbotax, OS X and Interactive Brokers TXF file

If you’re having trouble getting TT to import IB’s (or anyone else’s) TXF file, it’s because ‘rename’ doesn’t actually change the extension to TXF. Do it in the finder in the ‘Get Info’ window and it will work. Now can I get an hour of my life back?

I just figured out. GoDaddy Bookkeeping has a button that reads " export as .TXF" But when downloaded to your mac will will be something like “Schedule_C 2016.txf.txt” if you try to open it it will open with text editor. I tried to rename it to change the extension but it didn’t work, turbotax still don’t see it.

What you do is. Open Finder, right click the file and click Get Info, then under Name & Extension box, change the extension from what ever is there to .txf. Try again to open in with the turbotax dialog box and this time it will be seen by Turbotax.

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I just download the text version of the 8949 and take the totals from each section for my tax forms. IB’s file has more detail than the 1099 suggests - for example it often has the trades for the noncovered securities that go on 8949 1B or 2E (traded partnerships mostly).