Thursday 10 December 2015

HMRC Wooden Spoon Nomination


My thanks to a Loyal Reader who pointed out that Money Mail is looking for votes for their Wooden Spoon Award, which HMRC has featured in for six years running.

Why not make it seven years in a row?

Vote for HMRC via thisismoney.co.uk/spoon

No Wooden Spoon contest is complete without the taxman gracing the list. Incredibly, this is the sixth year in a row that HM Revenue & Customs has featured. Will it ever get its act together?

The introduction this year of the new marriage tax allowance was shambolic. Problems with the application process triggered a flood of furious letters to our postbag.

In most cases, you’d been unable to get the tax break because you couldn’t pass the online test

to prove your identity. Some of you wrote to complain, but didn’t get a response for months.

To qualify, older applicants were asked for credit card, mortgage, passport or driving licence details. This froze out those who have paid off their mortgage, don’t borrow, have only a paper driving licence or no longer go abroad.

The usual problems were also prevalent: callers have also been kept on the line for nearly an hour to speak to an adviser; readers told how separate departments failed to pass on information to each other; and families were unexpectedly hit with massive bills.

In particular, millions of elderly taxpayers keep being told that they owe thousands of pounds — but can’t get an explanation as to why. Worse, their appeal is often thrown out by officials. Only when their dispute goes to the Adjudicator, the tax watchdog, is it finally upheld. For many of those forced to fight HMRC, the most troubling aspect is that despite not putting a foot wrong, they’re held accountable for a tax mistake they haven’t even made.

A spokesperson for HMRC says: ‘Our service levels have not been good enough at busy periods this year, and improvements to our service have taken longer than we’d hoped. We have taken major steps to improve, including the recruitment of 3,000 new staff into customer service roles.’


Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

2 comments:

  1. It has been said that this lot would struggle to finish last in a 1 horse race!

    How anyone in there is collecting a bonus award beggars belief.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Just had a browse of the results from the 2015 people survey, did I miss its publication on here?

    Perusal of the results my well be enlightening and no matter how much lipstick is applied, a pig is still a pig. I won't include any figures but merely suggest yo look closely at some of the questions and the way one is allowed to complete - results, could have been worse if things were not skewed so much?
    Perhaps the PCS and ARC brass should be lobbied for their views as to how some of the options were given less options and why? Cue X-Files tune....

    ReplyDelete