Posted by Harry Hertz, the Baldrige Cheermudgeon
All that resonated in my mind this weekend was the old Beatles' tune, "Taxman". Not because of the Beatles' theme about paying too much in taxes, but because I recall one of the U.S. tax preparation companies subsequently using it for their advertisement to prepare your taxes. And I needed help this past weekend (another Beatles' song...."Help, I need somebody..."). I was tearing out the few hairs I still have. But, I digress, this is not about the Beatles or hair restoration. It is about tax preparation software.
I was busy at my computer this past Saturday, filling out my tax return (who's returning what anyway?), when it all went wrong. I had downloaded my W-2 from the government and my interest income from the bank into the tax application and had entered my credit union interest income, and now moved to the next section and was entering data. All of a sudden, I noticed the numbers changing in the tax status window. You know, the window where it tells you how much you owe or are being refunded at this point. Decreasing without me having hit enter for any new data. So, I went to the tax summary page and noticed that my bank interest income was gone. I re-downloaded and re-entered it and saved the return. I went back to the section I was working on and a few seconds later...bam...it was gone again. I exited the program and tried again...bam... I rebooted the computer and tried again...bam... Round 1 of tearing hair out.
I went to the on-line help area and "chatted" with their support person. I rapidly determined that she was only a data base that triggered on keywords in my query. No help! I finally found their "live" on-line help. After waiting it seemed an hour (it wasn't), I gave up and fortunately was rescued for the rest of the day by a dinner engagement.
I got up early the next morning and called the software company's 800 number help line. They only open at 8 or 9 AM Pacific time. I was way too early. Tear more hair out!
I finally realized this can't be happening to everyone, or there would have been a fix by now. So the only obvious variables were the two sources from which I downloaded information. So, I entered everything manually and...no bam...it worked.
I told the story to my computer scientist son and he speculated about a database download resulting in a check-sum error, that led to the data being erased. Sure, but I just want to file my taxes by April 15th!
So, what does this have to do with Baldrige? Have the software gurus at any of these companies read Category 4 of the Baldrige Criteria, "Measurement, Analysis, and Knowledge Management"? How do they ensure that software is reliable, secure, and user-friendly? How do they ensure data accuracy and reliability? And, most of all, how do they protect poor users like me from filing inaccurate returns? Now I wonder about the errors in the software that I don't catch, because they are buried in computations!
What are your software application or database stories? Would use of the Baldrige Criteria help your vendors? This has been a long blog entry, but I feel better now!



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