A new TurboTax customer is someone who did not file tax year 2024 with TurboTax.

Tax year 2024 is the only year the definition names, and the only year it looks at. Whether you have ever used TurboTax sits outside it, and so does whether you hold a TurboTax account. A one-year lookback at one named tax year is the whole test, and it is the condition most likely to make a referral link quietly worth nothing to the person clicking it.

Where that sentence sits, which matters more than it sounds

Intuit's referral document is organised by who is being paid: an Advocate section for the person sharing the link, a Friend section for the person using it. The new-customer definition lives in the Advocate section, attached to the reward. The full clause reads: "In order for an Advocate to qualify for a Reward, each Friend must: (1) be a new TurboTax customer; and (2) access and purchase a paid TurboTax Online or TurboTax Experts product (depending on specific promotion) only using the unique Link provided in the invitation received between October 8, 2025 and October 31, 2026."

Read strictly, that is a condition on your friend getting paid, not on you getting the discount. The Friend Discount paragraph a few lines below never repeats the words "new TurboTax customer". Intuit's marketing page, though, says the discount itself checks your history.

Either way, if you filed tax year 2024 with TurboTax, this offer is not for you, and the surest loser is the friend whose link you used, because their reward is expressly conditioned on your being new.

The result is backwards, and it is not a typo

Because the lookback is exactly one tax year, loyalty is the disqualifier and leaving is the qualifier. Somebody who filed with TurboTax for tax year 2023 and then moved to a competitor for tax year 2024 fits the definition. Somebody who has used TurboTax faithfully, including last time, does not, whosever link they click.

Intuit writes this rule four different ways, on two pages

Within the same two documents we read, the same idea appears in four different formulations, and two of them do not mean quite the same thing.

1. The binding terms. "A new TurboTax customer is defined as someone who did not file in the previous tax year 2024 with TurboTax." That is a tax year: the 2024 return, the one most people filed in spring 2025.
2. The referral marketing page, twice. "they did not use TurboTax to file their taxes in 2024", and "anyone who did not use TurboTax to file their taxes in 2024". Read literally, that is a calendar year of filing activity, and for most households the return filed during 2024 was the tax year 2023 return.
3. The same page, a third way. "Your friend must be a new customer (did not file with TurboTax in 2024) and meet the other requirements of the program". Same ambiguity, shorter.
4. A neighbouring Intuit offer, on the terms page itself. The TurboTax Free Mobile App Offer says: "You are not eligible for this offer if you used TurboTax to file your 2024 taxes." That phrasing means the tax year 2024 return, matching the referral contract.

The gap between "the previous tax year 2024" and "in 2024" is a whole filing season wide. Somebody who filed their tax year 2023 return with TurboTax in April 2024 and then switched away for tax year 2024 is new under the binding terms and, read literally, not new under the marketing sentence. The contract is the document that binds, and it says tax year 2024. But if you are standing exactly on that edge, expect Intuit's system rather than Intuit's sentence to decide, because the terms reserve that: "Referrals and Rewards are subject to verification at Intuit's sole discretion."

The word the terms never define is the word doing the work

Everything hinges on "file". The document does not define it, and we found no Intuit page that does. Here is what remains open, with no invented answers attached.

The year is pinned to 2024 and never moves

Programmes like this usually say "the previous tax year" and let it roll forward. This one names the year. The whole window runs "between October 8, 2025 and October 31, 2026", which spans two filing seasons, and across the entire span the definition still says tax year 2024. Somebody who did not file tax year 2024 with TurboTax, then filed their tax year 2025 return with TurboTax in the spring of 2026, still satisfies the sentence as written. We are reporting the wording, not recommending a manoeuvre: the terms let Intuit verify at its sole discretion and let it "delay, cancel, revoke, or prevent payment of gift card funds, charitable donations or other rewards in any suspected case of fraudulent use of the Program, violation of the Program terms, use of false identities or misuse of TurboTax products and services".

Why the fresh email address does not work

It fails on two separate grounds. The definition is written about a filing, not about an account: creating a new address does not unfile a return, and Intuit is matching against its own filing records. And the terms anticipate the move and prohibit it. The Advocate agrees "To use only one email address and one identity to participate in the Program, and not to create or use multiple identities, entities or email addresses to participate in the Program-- which shall be immediate grounds for termination and non-payment of any/all Rewards", and separately agrees not to open TurboTax accounts on someone else's behalf to enable use of the discount. Both sanctions fall on the Advocate.

The five-minute check, before you ask anyone for a link

1. Find out where your tax year 2024 return was filed. Not what you remember, what the paperwork says. Your 2024 return was the one due in April 2025. If it came out of TurboTax, stop here: no link helps you.
2. Check the household, not just yourself. The single most common quiet disqualification is a joint return somebody else drove. If a tax year 2024 return with your name on it went through TurboTax, treat yourself as not new.
3. Confirm you were going to pay in the first place. The terms exclude "Free products, TurboTax Free Edition, TurboTax Desktop products, and TurboTax State preparation and filing services" from the reward side, and exclude Free Edition, state returns and CD or download products from the discount. If you were going to file free, being new is worth nothing.
4. Get the link from a person. The terms bar an Advocate from sharing it "with any third party discount, coupon or affiliate program site as part of any third party program or in the form of any advertising or promotional placement, whether paid or unpaid". That is why this page carries no link.
5. Watch the cart total, not the badge. The discount "cannot be combined with any other offer" and, as the referral page puts it, "the best offer or discount will be automatically added to your cart". Eligibility is necessary, not sufficient.

If you are not new, what is actually left

Not the referral, and no version of it. There is no waiver in the document, no returning-customer variant, and no appeal described anywhere in the terms. What is left is the ordinary pricing everybody else gets, plus whatever seasonal promotion Intuit is running. One consolation: the Expert Full Service Offer on the same terms page is "available only to customers who did not file with TurboTax Live Full Service in tax year 2024", a product-specific test, so a long-standing do-it-yourself filer can be a new customer for that offer while failing the referral test. And if you are the one with the link, the definition is still your problem: your reward depends on your friend being new. The TurboTax referral guide sets out what the 20% covers and why no site like this one is permitted to hand you the link.

New customer FAQ

Who counts as a new TurboTax customer?

Someone who did not file tax year 2024 with TurboTax. One sentence, one named tax year, no reference to accounts or email addresses.

Does a new email address make me new?

No. The definition is about a filing, not a login, and the terms separately forbid multiple identities and opening accounts on someone else's behalf.

I used TurboTax years ago but not last year. Am I new?

On the wording Intuit publishes, yes. The lookback stops at tax year 2024.

My spouse filed our joint return with TurboTax. Am I a returning customer?

The terms do not say, and we found no Intuit page that does. We would assume not new, because the checking is Intuit's and the cost of being wrong falls on your friend's reward.

What if I claim it and I am not eligible?

"Referrals and Rewards are subject to verification at Intuit's sole discretion". In practice the discount either appears in the cart or does not, and the reward is what silently fails.

Second opinions

Other definitions that decide whether you qualify

Every one of these is read from the company’s own document and dated. See all 59 questions we have answered.