At a glance
- HMRC’s telephone helpline cut off 44,000 callers after 70-minute waits in 2023/24, with only 66.4% of calls answered against an 85% target.
- The Public Accounts Committee criticised HMRC for deliberately letting phone services fail to push people towards digital options, despite seven million people being unable to use online services.
- The Committee recommends reinstating wait time targets, allocating more resources to customer service, and taking bolder action on tax system abuse.
More than 40,000 taxpayers and tax agents who waited 70 minutes to speak to an HMRC adviser were cut off, because its telephone helpline system “cannot cope with so many customers waiting in the call queue,” according to a UK parliamentary committee report.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) 2023/24 report into HMRC’s customer service and accounts found the UK tax authority’s customer services “have deteriorated even further since this Committee last reported a year ago”. During the first 11 months of 2023/24, HMRC cut off nearly 44,000 customers that had been waiting 70 minutes to speak to someone.
HMRC “has been too willing to let its telephone services fail in the hope this forces people to use its digital services instead,” stated the PAC. The committee had received “numerous written submissions from organisations representing taxpayers and agents saying these continual failings in customer service had eroded trust in HMRC”.
Performance at an ‘all-time low’
The report said that “performance reached an all-time low” in 2023/24: HMRC only answered 66.4% of telephone callers’ attempts to speak to one of its advisers, when its target is to answer 85% of calls. It added that the average call waiting time in that tax year exceeded 23 minutes. HMRC blamed its poor telephone customer services on its telephone platform’s limitations, and “says it will be procuring a new platform soon,” the report added.
Because taxpayers and their agents “have no choice but to engage with HMRC” the onus is therefore “on HMRC to provide a reasonable level of service” – but HMRC “last met an annual target for telephone services in 2017–18,” the PAC report noted.
Charlene Young, AJ Bell pensions and savings expert, commented that HMRC’s failure to answer a third of all attempts to speak to an adviser was “an astounding figure and illustrates perfectly why MPs have warned that HMRC’s failures have damaged faith in the tax system”.
Young added that the report “suggests HMRC may have allowed this situation to develop partly in order to force more people through its online channels … it’s no surprise millions of taxpayers end up missing tax deadlines”.
The ongoing freeze on income tax thresholds, the inheritance nil-rate band and other allowances “mean more and more people are being dragged into the tax system,” Young added. “All of this means added pressure on HMRC, which it appears ill-equipped to deal with.”
Not all tax services available online
The PAC reported that HMRC estimates 66% of telephone calls it receives could be handled through its online services instead – but not all its tax services are available online “and where they are available, they do not always provide the reassurance that customers need”.
The report also found that HMRC has been too quick to restrict access to its telephone services before ensuring replacement digital services are fully in place. HMRC’s own figures estimate that seven million people can’t use online services – but HMRC does not always provide efficient ways for taxpayers and their agents to communicate with it digitally, the report added.
Despite this, HMRC trialled some telephone helpline closures with only two days’ notice to taxpayers twice in 2023 – and in April 2024 it was forced to reverse a decision to close them permanently following backlash.
Calls for HMRC to reinstate call waiting time targets
The PAC recommended HMRC should centre taxpayers’ needs in its decision-making, both for individuals and for small businesses. It said HMRC should reinstate a call waiting time target as a key performance measure, and allocate enough resources to its customer service now and in the future to meet its performance targets, with additional resources to be deployed where needed.
Additionally, HMRC should prioritise introducing systems for taxpayers and agents to electronically submit files and send secure messages, which “should enable savings which can be recycled into improving its service,” the report added.
The PAC report also found that HMRC’s investment in debt management has “not sufficiently reduced” the amount of tax owed to HMRC. It noted that high levels of new tax debt were driven by small businesses’ cash flow issues, and that HMRC was focusing on pursuing new tax debts but not older tax debts.
The PAC also expressed concerns that HMRC plans to reduce the number of prosecutions for deliberate tax non-compliance, despite having a range of criminal enforcement powers. The committee called for HMRC to be bolder in tackling abuse of the UK tax system, and “plan for how it recovers older tax debts before they become uncollectable”.
