Loyal readers will recall that HMRC's Charter has been mentioned a few times over the years on this site.
Unsurprisingly, there is quite a gap between its intentions and HMRC's actual performance.
The ICAEW notes that HMRC has struggled to maintain business-as-usual
service levels during the coronavirus pandemic and cannot improve
services as envisaged in its Charter without more resource.
After gathering feedback from ICAEW members, the Tax Faculty has
written to HMRC’s Charter Stakeholder Group outlining concerns about how
HMRC performed against its Charter during 2020/21.
Published in November 2020, the Charter
outlines what taxpayers can expect when interacting with HMRC. It
includes standards of behaviour and values, such as getting things
right, making things easy and being responsive.
In ICAEW Rep 43/21,
ICAEW acknowledges that HMRC deserves commendation for its work in
delivering COVID-19 financial support schemes, but concludes that this
has come at the expense of its standard work with the day-to-day
experience of taxpayers and agents continuing to deteriorate.
It concludes:
“HMRC’s performance against the standards in the
Charter reflects the limited resources available to it, with the result
that it has struggled to provide a satisfactory level of operational
business-as-usual performance let alone update its systems to improve
online services for taxpayers and agents.
The government has provided some funding, but substantial
improvement is likely to take the 10 years envisaged in the tax
administration strategy.”
ICAEW warns that poor systems and inadequate training mean that
HMRC’s staff are not able to deliver the commitment to “get things
right” in the Charter. It highlights data processing in PAYE real time
information, self assessment calculations and out of date tax codes as
examples of long-standing issues caused by HMRC systems.
Furthermore, the faculty argues:
“HMRC has considerably more work to
do to live up to the Charter standard to make things easy, in particular
in relation to online services.”
It cites the trust registration service and the online portal for
reporting capital gains, as examples of new services that have not only
failed to make tax administration any easier, but actually introduced
“many additional problems”.
In examining HMRC’s responsiveness, ICAEW argues that HMRC needs to
focus on returning services to pre-pandemic levels.
“Taxpayers need a
commitment from HMRC about when service levels (and helpline hours) will
return to target standards, and in particular when priority access
might be restored to the agent dedicated line.”
While it struggled to maintain service levels during 2020/21, ICAEW
confirms that HMRC has generally been able to meet its commitments to
treat taxpayers fairly and with respect, being aware of taxpayers’
personal situations (particularly the impact of COVID-19) and keeping
data secure.
On its commitment to recognise that taxpayers can be represented by
another, ICAEW concludes that while this is often met, there are:
“…instances where gaps in online services for agents and cumbersome
agent authorisation processes mean that, in practice, it is often made
very difficult to be represented by a third party.”
ICAEW’s response will inform the Charter Stakeholder Group’s
evaluation of the extent to which HMRC has demonstrated the standards of
behaviour and values in its Charter. The group’s conclusions will be
published in an Annual Report later in 2021.
The ACCA also wades in,
Glenn Collins (Head of ACCA Technical Advisory)stated:
“A lack of necessary investment risks has damaged the relationship
HMRC has with compliant taxpayers and agents.
The people who end up holding the cost and inconvenience are
taxpayers and accountants. The cost is being pushed down to those who
are causing the least problems for HMRC. You simply have to look at the
delays in VAT registration for new businesses, who are looking to pay
VAT to the exchequer but can’t get registered.”
These criticisms and suggestions are all very well, but HMRC is not going to fix them anytime soon. In the meantime taxpayers and their agents are screwed, as HMRC has basically ground to juddering halt!
Tax does have to be taxing.
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