Revenue workload 'needs better handling'

HMRC contact centres failed to answer more than two million (one third) of taxpayers’ calls in the lead up to the self assessment deadline in January 2008, according to a new report from the National Audit Office (NAO), which focuses on the work processes within the Revenue’s income tax and tax credit sections.

The document criticises the taxman for providing a less responsive service at busy times, which not only see taxpayers receiving delayed responses to their correspondences or none at all, but also lead to complex tax cases being ignored and an increase in staff absences.

The NAO does, however, acknowledge that the Revenue has smoothed out some of the large peaks in its workload by introducing different filing deadlines for paper and online income tax self assessment returns. This has also released resources of £7 million a year.

In 2007-08, HMRC processed more than four million self assessment returns during January to March, and they received more than one million tax credit renewals forms in the deadline month of July – which was brought forward to reduce overpayments, resulting in a greater workload peak.

Using different processing targets throughout the year and giving taxpayers more information about how long their information will take to process during peak periods could help spread work out over 12 months, said the NAO.

The office went on to note that during busy periods, the Revenue tends to process simpler income tax cases, postponing more complex checks and less urgent work. During peak periods, staff productivity is higher, partly reflecting the simpler cases, but the department also experiences increased staff sickness absence.

Although the tax credit processing peak coincides with a trough in income tax work, HMRC do not move staff between the two areas because of the need to deal with the build-up of post and other work from peak periods, limitations in computer systems, and the staff training that would be required.

The taxman could make greater use of modern employment practices used by other organisations, such as part-year permanent contracts, said the NAO, which also suggested that by reducing the number of avoidable calls to taxpayers by 15% the Revenue could release resources of up to £23 million a year.

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