HMRC: Call Waiting Times

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Beecham

Wednesday 29th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to improve HM Revenue and Customs call waiting times.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde (Con)]

My Lords, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs has improved its call waiting times. Over the last six months, it has consistently answered calls in an average of six minutes—a significant improvement from earlier in 2015. It is introducing a number of service improvements, including digital tax accounts, webchat and moving to a seven-day-a-week service, as well as ensuring that online guidance meets customer needs.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, the National Audit Office reported in May that the original cut by one third in staff numbers dealing with personal taxpayers led to a 50% increase in costs to taxpayers, costing them four times as much as HMRC saved. While matters have now improved somewhat, there are still around 3 million cases of discrepancies in personal tax records requiring investigation. Do the Government recognise that it is self-defeating, with £120 billion of uncollected tax, to offer such a poor service to taxpayers and that the situation is being made worse by closing offices, substantially cutting staff and relying increasingly on digital services to which many people do not have access? If so, what do they propose to do about it?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The noble Lord is right to draw attention to the National Audit Office report, which drew attention to things that HMRC had already taken into account. It made five recommendations: one was already superseded because it had been attended to, one was recommended by HMRC itself and three were accepted and are in progress. HMRC has increased the number of its customer services staff. It has undertaken its biggest ever training programme. Call waiting times are coming down significantly and it has a two-minute target. Of course, raising revenue is what HMRC is about, and last year it raised a record amount of revenue, the largest ever in its history.