Children: Day Care

(asked on 4th June 2019) - View Source

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many complaints relating to the tax-free childcare scheme have been received by HMRC as of 31 May 2019.


Answered by
Elizabeth Truss Portrait
Elizabeth Truss
This question was answered on 11th June 2019

More than half a million parents have successfully opened a childcare account, and the vast majority of parents use the childcare service without issues. Since Tax-Free Childcare (TFC) was fully rolled out in February 2018, the rate of new complaints received by HMRC in relation to the childcare service has decreased substantially, while the number of users of TFC has more than trebled.

However, it is not possible to break down complaints received about the childcare service between TFC and 30 hours free childcare complaints, as many parents receive both TFC and 30 hours free childcare.

I refer the honorable member to my answer on 28 November 2018 (193504) https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2018-11-20/193504/, which sets out that to 31 October 2018, HMRC received 4,560 complaints from parents who experienced technical issues with the childcare service.

From 1 November 2018 to 31 March 2019, HMRC received 943 new complaints from customers in relation to TFC and 30 hours free childcare (known as Tier 1). This includes complaints due to technical issues and customer service issues.

From 1 November 2018 to 31 March 2019, HMRC received 205 complaints from customers in relation to TFC and 30 hours free childcare where a customer was dissatisfied with our decision on their initial complaint and they have asked us to look at their concerns again (known as Tier 2).

As set out in HMRC’s monthly reports available for the 2018-19 period at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/hmrc-monthly-performance-reports#reporting-year-2018-to-2019, complaints are not always logged on HMRC’s live system during the month they are received and the numbers can, therefore, be revised upwards for subsequent monthly reports. The current month will be subject to greatest revision. The information to 31 May is therefore not yet available to a robust enough standard.

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