The Delaware Department of Justice announced that Attorney General Kathy Jennings secured over $400,000 from the owner of TurboTax, Intuit Inc., for low-income residents who paid for tax services that should have been free.

Intuit struck an agreement with all 50 states and the District of Columbia to pay a total of $141 million in restitution to customers who were unfairly charged. Under the agreement, Intuit must remove TurboTax’s “free, free, free” ad campaign which deceived customers into paying for their services.

“Intuit benefited from a special agreement with the U.S. government to provide free tax services to low-income consumers nationwide, all while preventing Delawarean consumers from taking advantage of those free services,” Ms. Jennings said.

“Intuit engaged in deceptive and unfair tactics to hide access to free services and to instead promote its own profit-generating tax filing products instead. Delawareans who struggle to put food on the table shouldn’t be tricked into paying for tax preparation services they don’t need. My office will continue to protect consumers statewide and be on the lookout for businesses who seek to take advantage of them.”

An investigation into Intuit and the company’s business practices came after reports that deceptive digital tactics were being used to direct low-income consumers toward their products. The investigation found that Intuit aimed to limit their customers’ participation in the IRS Free File Program, using similar names for the program and their commercial “freemium” product.

The state’s involvement in this investigation was handled for the Delaware Department of Justice by their Consumer Protection Unit.