Jacky Wright To Be New HMRC CDIO

Computer Weekly reports that HMRC has tasked Microsoft corporate vice-president Jacky Wright with helping the department achieve its goal of becoming one of the world's most digitally advanced tax authorities.

Jacky Wright will be HMRC's new chief digital and information officer (CDIO) as from 16 October.

 

Wright will be taking over from interim CDIO Mike Potter, who has held the position since Mark Dearnley’s departure in September 2016. Potter is leaving for a directorship at the Brexit-focused Future Borders programme.

At present, Wright is working as a corporate vice-president at Microsoft’s core platform division, and has previously held the position of CIO at both General Electric and Momentive Performance Materials.

Wright said :

“I am passionate about the impact innovation can have in truly transforming services for people and businesses in a positive way and want to continue the great work being done within HMRC and across the Civil Service at this time.

I am proud to represent women and BAME [black, Asian and minority ethnic] in technology and will continue to promote the vital role of diversity within our industry and more broadly.”

The role comes with an annual salary of up to £180,000, and is billed as an opportunity to “shape and transform the way HMRC works” as it pursues its goal to become the “one of the most digitally advanced tax administrations in the world”.

Jon Thompson, CEO of HMRC, said:

“Balancing strong operating experience with a record of driving innovation, Jacky is widely recognised for her contributions to technology and diversity.

Her influence as a technology leader and champion for the role of women and BAME in industry is a major win for this organisation.

This builds on a year of real progress and innovation under the leadership of interim CDIO Mike Potter, who has done a fantastic job of pushing digital delivery for HMRC and its customers.”

Here is a biography of her, as per The Human Capital Institute:

"Jacky Wright is a transformational global leader, innovative technologist and recognized STEM advocate.

She is a senior executive whose extensive career spans multiple industries. Jacky inspires and leads teams to drive innovation, develop enterprise technology solutions, and transform business models.
As a Microsoft leader, she has created deep partnerships between IT and product engineering to drive digital transformation of customer experiences leveraging Microsoft Azure, Power BI, O365, and Skype for Business, among others.

She has been widely recognized for her many contributions in technology and diversity, including an honorary doctorate from Aston University, and inclusion on the Britain’s Powerlist 100 of Most Influential People, the Top 100 BAME Leaders in Business, and Savoy Magazine’s Top Women list. She has also been featured in numerous publications, including CIO Magazine, “Meet a tech industry pioneer who leads by example” and the Wall Street Journal – CIO Journal.

Jacky is a member of the Board of Trustees for Harvey Mudd College and Prostate Cancer UK, and serves on the Board of Year Up – Puget Sound Chapter. She also serves on various advisory boards, including the HP Women’s Innovation Council, the Demo CIO Council and the CIO Winmark Advisory Panel. She is also a member of the Information Technology Senior Management Forum (ITSMF), Executive Leadership Council and CIO Executive Council."

At least now, maybe, HMRC will upgrade from Windows 7!

Tax does have to be taxing.

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

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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



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HMRC Recruiting CDIO

HMRC is in the process of recruiting a new chief digital information officer (CDIO) at director general level, following Mark Dearnley’s departure in autumn 2016.

The advert states that the role, which theoretically will make HMRC one of the “most digitally advanced tax administrations anywhere in the world”, pays up to £180K per annum.

"HMRC is looking to recruit a new Director General (DG) Chief Digital Information Officer (CDIO). This is a substantial and challenging role with significant involvement in the Government’s digital agenda as well as leading on HMRC’s digital strategy. The CDIO will shape and transform the way HMRC work - developing the capability to provide better online services to the taxpayer and customer to achieve faster and more effective models of delivery at optimal cost. The role requires the ability to engage and lead people as well as position HMRC in the cross government agenda playing a full role across Whitehall and supporting smaller government departments. The CDIO will lead the 2200 people strong department and manage an expenditure of more than £800million.

The candidate for the role will bring a proven track record of successfully leading a large-scale IT division with extensive experience and professional capabilities, including high level digital strategy expertise gained from a multi-channel business. S/he will possess Board level leadership experience of driving an extensive and challenging change programme across large, complex and multi-functional private or public sector organisations. S/he will be a successful manager of complex multi-location teams and be able to work within a rapidly evolving environment. S/he will have proven ability to challenge, influence and debate as is befitting of a Director-General level role. Experience likely to be drawn from a previous CIO role (or equivalent) in similar large, complex and multidimensional organisation."

Good luck to those who apply!

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



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Dearnley Quit HMRC For More Money

In August I wrote about the departure of Mark Dearnley (HMRC's chief digital and information officer):

"PAC must have had an inkling that he was about to abandon ship, as they asked HMRC at the time if was going to stay. HMRC responded that they were in negotiations with him!"

It seems that the reason he left was because the £185K per annum job in HMRC was not well paid enough.

Speaking at a Commons public accounts committee hearing lest week, Jon Thompson, chief executive of the UK tax body, was asked why Dearnley quit his role. He is quoted by The Register:

"We made Mr Dearnley a very attractive offer, which would have made him one of the highest-paid director generals in the civil service and significantly more than me in my role as chief executive.

But he decided to take another role. The market had spoken."

Asked if Dearnley's departure will have a negative impact, Thompson said it would not. He said HMRC has appointed Mike Potter as acting chief digital and information officer, who worked closely with Dearnley.

We shall see!

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



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Mark Dearnley Quits HMRC

In June this year I wrote about Mark Dearnley's (HMRC's chief digital and information officer who joined in October 2013 from Vodafone) appearance before PAC:

"Dearnley told PAC this week that the new company had been set up specifically to provide "a better employment offer for the staff coming in from the private sector", including better base pay and pensions than could be expected as direct employees of HMRC.

However, he is quoted by Public Technology:

"It is limited by the pay cap.
But it does have a different salary scale and remuneration structure, so in that, we've been able to put together what we believe is a much more appropriate offer for people coming in from the private sector."

Adding:

"I'm sure this will be an ongoing topic of conversation with the Treasury over the next few years."

His last comment about having an ongoing discussion with the Treasury for years is somewhat ironic, as it transpires he is leaving HMRC in September for pastures new in the private sector.

This may cause a few headaches within HMRC, as PAC warned that management needs to be stable during the transition from Aspire. As per PAC:

“HMRC is now making progress in replacing the Aspire contract, but moving to a new model of IT provision remains a substantial undertaking which will require firm and consistent leadership.

As we have seen from elsewhere in government, one of the main factors that determines the success of complex programmes such as this is the quality and stability of their leadership.”

PAC must have had an inkling that he was about to abandon ship, as they asked HMRC at the time if was going to stay. HMRC rresponded that they were in negotiations with him!

As per Computer Weekly, Dearnley gave a valedictory statement about his almost 3 years in HMRC:

"We have replaced our outdated internal IT, launched digital tax accounts for individuals and businesses, and have successfully concluded negotiations to dismantle the Aspire IT contract, taking more direct control of the design and delivery of our digital technology services at huge cost savings for HMRC.

We have also built one of the strongest digital technology teams in the world, and I am confident that they will continue to deliver HMRC’s IT transformation at pace.”

Any guesses as to which company he will join?

Who knows, maybe he will get to sell into HMRC advice and/or software as it moves towards its glorious digital future?

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



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You Pay Peanuts You Get Monkeys

As loyal readers know, HMRC is doing away with its Aspire contract in favour of shorter contracts with a wider range of suppliers.

In order to ensure a smooth transition from the contract, HMRC has set up a new government-owned company called Revenue and Customs Digital Technology Service (RCDTS). Its purpose is to directly employ private sector contractors who had been working for Capgemini.

However, there is a fly in the oinkment for those who switch from private to public; as there is an ongoing Treasury policy of limiting all annual payrises across the public sector to 1% until at least 2020.

This is ironic as Dearnley told PAC this week that the new company had been set up specifically to provide "a better employment offer for the staff coming in from the private sector", including better base pay and pensions than could be expected as direct employees of HMRC.

However, he is quoted by Public Technology:

"It is limited by the pay cap.

But it does have a different salary scale and remuneration structure, so in that, we've been able to put together what we believe is a much more appropriate offer for people coming in from the private sector."

Adding:

"I'm sure this will be an ongoing topic of conversation with the Treasury over the next few years."

In other words this deal hasn't been agreed/signed off by the Treasury!

Seemingly more than a quarter of the private contractors, eligible for transfer into the civil service, have chosen not to do so.

"This was them making a personal choice that they either wanted a career somewhere else or they found a different job with a current employer, or it was their moment to retire or go off to do something different. 

That level of attrition that we saw was actually lower than we expected – but in line with the industry standard."

Maybe the civil service and the government needs to rethink how it rewards and retains people?

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"

HMRC Wins Digital Project of The Year

HMRC has won ‘Digital Project of the Year’ in awards held on 18 November.

The award recognises the progress HMRC has made in its ongoing digital transformation.

Specifically, the award recognises the Multi-Channel Digital Tax Platform. MDTP gives HMRC the agility and speed required by a digital-first organisation, while fully meeting requirements around legacy systems and security policies.

MDTP’s microservice architecture enables multiple agile teams to rapidly build, deploy and operate services, with enhancements going live almost daily.

Mark Dearnley, Chief Digital and Information Officer at HMRC, is quoted by Business Wire:

“The Tax Platform is the foundation on which the Department’s digital future is being built. We can now deliver new services in just weeks not months, and make changes in hours not weeks. 

When people talk about inspirational use of technology, this is the kind of project they mean.”

Ryan Sikorsky, co-founder and Director at Equal Experts, said

“It's wonderful to have our work recognised by judges at the UK IT Industry awards. It’s testimony to the power of our collaborative approach – we’re proud to have helped HMRC become a more open, digitally capable organisation, one with a strong focus on the needs of the public.”

Well then it seems that, on the IT side at least, HMRC is a success story!

Comments anyone?

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"

HMRC's £165K Role for a Head in The Cloud

HMRC is looking for a cloud transformation director, and will pay up to £162,500 for the right person.

According to HMRC's advert, HMRC had a "vision" (how very messianic of it) for the provision of online, real-time services to be accessible from any device, any time using the latest cloud technology.

Hence HMRC is looking for an IT leader who is "up for the challenge of delivering transformation on a massive scale". 

"HMRC currently has a hugely complex IT estate, ranging from ‘state of the art' data analytics platforms to 40-year-old systems. The breadth, variety and complexity of these systems and the business processes they support are on a scale rarely seen in other global organisations." 

HMRC wants to "take back control of its IT architecture".

The successful candidate will have to already be a "politically astute leader" (that is for sure true!) with experience of delivering £50m+ infrastructure transformation projects across complex IT systems.

The person tasked with the job will report to Mark Dearnley, and will be given a three-year, fixed-term full-time role.

Those interested can apply here.

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"

HMRC Aspires For Expertise

HMRC is seeking "transformation expertise" in order to exit Aspire in 2017.

HMRC is offering a two-year, £20m contract for a partner with "experience of managing large post-merger work force integrations and the significant people and cultural issues that arise".

 
HMRC needs an injection of strategic-level experience and capacity to support people and culture transformation.
The tender, which is also issued in the name of HMRC's chief digital and information officer (CDIO) Mark Dearnley, says it requires a Programme Management Office to undertake the management aspects of the programme.

HMRC is quoted by Government Computing saying that it envisages that the "lead transformation partner will provide leadership of the PMO and work alongside HMRC employees."

Basically Whitehall doesn't believe that HMRC has the ability to achieve that exit without external expertise.

A supplier event is to be held in London in the week commencing 8th June 2015, with bidders warned to expect that after evaluation, they may be required to attend an interview in London week commencing 20th July 2015.

The contract will begin barely a month later, on 1st September (how the fark will HMRC be able to evaluate the tenders so quickly?) and is due to end on 31st August 2017.

Those interested may apply here.

Good luck!

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"

Three Year Managers For Ten Year Projects - Dearnley's Binary Revolution

My thanks to the loyal reader who penned this most excellent analysis about Dearnley and the "binary revolution" in HMRC:

"Dearnley is a probably being economical with the actualité like so many members of HMRC’s Ex Com.

The constant shouting of the word 'Digital' to describe their IT strategy should immediately ring alarm bells since by their very nature all the Departments computers have been digital (ie using binary compiled code) since the date the Inland Revenue bought their very first LEO machine second hand from Joe Lyons in the 1960s. As a consequence the Revenue could claim to have digitised most of its work decades ago. It would be nice to see such obvious bullshit occasionally challenged at places like PAC.

More seriously, while Dearnley frequently likes to boast about his speedy roll out of Windows 7 to all HMRC desktops he negelects to mention that in the process it has broken loads of applications, created many problems and generated thousands of lost man hours of work

With regard to the problem of 'legacy' systems Dearnley seems to fail to understand or deliberately ignores the basic issue that all IT applications fall into that category the moment they hit the live metal and start running in anger. It does not matter whether they are 5 minutes old or 5 years old they all have to be maintained and they all face the issue that the software and hardware on which they were designed and run is sooner or later out of date. Moreover, political events and changes to legislation will mean the functionality is going to have to be constantly updated and enhanced.

It is certainly true that HMRC over the years has wound up with a huge IT estate running a wide range of different platforms, operating systems and applications. However, the people largely responsible for that situation are not the Revenues IT suppliers but the Board of HMRC itself, including individual like Dearnley and Pavitt who have constantly changed the core IT strategy. For example, a few years ago the mantra coming out of Ex Com was that HMRC was to buy not build its software so they invested massively in various proprietary COTS packages, many of which were costly and often incompatible with the Revenues needs so had to be expensively customised. Now the pendulum has swung completely the opposite way and HMRC now are betting the whole shooting match on Open Source systems and bespoke applications written in house. That punt may come off but it is a very high risk strategy particularly as much of the software being used is largely untried and unproven for running major government systems and the in house HMRC 'Digital' Teams in Newcastle and elsewhere have no experience of delivering and supporting systems on that scale. In addition, there is the very real worry that Dearnley appears to be funding his ambitions by stripping out investment in maintaining and supporting the existing legacy estate which still runs 99% of HMRC systems. If his grand schemes come to nothing then the Revenue could end up with the worst of all worlds with new systems not fit for purpose and old applications needing costly large scale upgrades to keep them running.

The suspicion is that Dearnley who spent a mere three years at Vodafone before cutting and running to HMRC in 2013 will do exactly the same thing to the Revenue when his contract expires in 2016. Unfortunately, by then HMRC may find its IT has been well and truly scuppered."

Ironically Accountancy Age, on the very same day as my article about Dearnley, wrote about outsourced tax credit Concentrix staff in Belfast being paid millions (approx £72M) to do nothing for three months as a result of a systemic HMRC IT failure.

Let us trust that Dearnley (if he is actually competent) doesn't regard this as merely a two/three year stepping stone role on his career path.

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"

Mark Dearnley Lives In The Past

Mark Dearnley, CIO of HMRC, recently gave an interview to CIO which was rather revealing.

He joined from Vodafone (there's irony for you) in 2013, and described his role as "nothing short of transforming a centuries-old organisation into a digital, modern, real time business".

Errmmm, HMRC is not centuries old; it was formed by Broon in 2005!

Anyhoo, that little snafu aside, Dearnley acknowledges the challenge presented by legacy systems, a long-standing issue for HMRC IT chiefs. He says he would like to consolidate tax systems from over 100 to "one or two".

Yet he regards the platforms used by HMRC as being fine, and rejects the idea they are somehow "bad platforms".

"This nation has survived and brought in trillions of pounds worth of tax on these platforms."

Yes, but just because something once worked it may no longer be fit for purpose now; given that people's working patterns have changed (eg multiple sources of income).

In fact he appears to be enamoured with batch processing:

"Is real-time brilliant and batch terrible? 

That's the wrong question. 

There are things for which batch is fine. 

There are other things where you need real-time updates."

He intends to cobble together old and new:

"Some of that will use things that are new. Some of that will take advantage of some of the great things that have been developed over the years.

There's no 'oh it's not new so it must be bad' - there's actually 'if it's ideal for the role let's build on it'.

He is also of the view that he has more than other Whitehall departments:

"Most people underestimate how much talent we have within HMRC.

It would appear we actually have more than some other parts of government. 

I have thousands of civil servants. We already run all of the platforms that collect 40% of the UK's tax. And I've managed to create what I think is quite a fantastic leadership team."

He waxed lyrical about the new team in Newcastle, which has moved tax credits renewals online in just eight weeks in start to finish Dearnley claims.

"We set up a Scrum team and said: 'Go and see what you can do, you've got eight weeks'. They built a complete tax credits renewals service in eight weeks from start to finish, and we integrated it in real time to all the back-end systems.

That went live in eight weeks. We thought if it went really well, maybe 80,000 people would use it during renewals – 410,000 people used it. I think we had about a 94% customer satisfaction rate, which is absolutely phenomenal."

Hmm, what say you loyal readers?

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"

HMRC's Cloudy Outlook

I am indebted to loyal readers who have commented on my recent Digital Revolution article, noting that HMRC's Outlook has been down for three days and there are problems when trying to log into HMRC's cloud based storage system. Additionally, there appear to be issues with regard to the internal mail system.

Seemingly Mark Dearnley has his team working day and night, but they still don't know how to fix it.

I would be grateful for more details as this progresses.

issues logging

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"

HMRC Goes Digital

Mark Dearnley (HMRC's new Chief Digital Information Officer) recently told delegates at the Ignite conference that HMRC will become a "fully accessible digital business”.

He is quoted by ComputerWorldUK:

“This is not a big bang programme, we are doing this agile, in two-week sprints.”

Seemingly HMRC will become a digital public service built on agile methods, open source software and internally developed skills.

Dearnley noted that HMRC needs to reduce its operating costs by 22%.

Dearnley quoted some statistics:

“We send out 193 million letters a year and receive 20 million letters and 73 million inbound calls.

There’s a huge amount more we can do.”

Adding:

“We will aim for a single view of the customer that you will be able to log on to and view. Business and individuals will be able to have a tax account just like an online bank account.

The offer will be tailored for the most tech savvy to the least.”

Dearnley said that real time information will also enable HMRC to inform taxpayers that a submission has been received and checked.

“Self-service means you get an instant answer.” 

There will also be a change to the six monthly roll-outs:

“Today we do two roll-outs a year and the systems go down for four days a year. Instead we are going to move to frequent roll-outs that happen over-night."

Dearnley's vision is to use as much open source as possible, with his happiness being maximised by "a cloud provider certified to IL3 for open stack data.”

As ever comments and views are welcome from all. 

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"

Mark Hall Warns of The Tail Wagging The Dog

In August Mark Hall, HMRC's outgoing Chief Information Officer (CIO) gave his incoming replacement (Mark Dearnley) some advice about the major challenges facing HMRC for when he arrives in October from Vodafone.

Was that the last that we would hear from Hall?

Apparently not, this week he has been speaking at Gartner’s Outsourcing & Strategic Partnerships Summit in London, where he offered some sage (a little IT pun there..very little) advice to HMRC and its Aspire contractors (mainly Capgemini).

Aspire (which costs £700M per annum) was set up in 2004, with prime contractor Capgemini delivering much of HMRC’s IT services via an ecosystem of suppliers that include BT, Fujitsu, and Level 3. The contract is due for renewal in 2017, and is currently being restructured.

Hall described it as a "child of its time", hardly a ringing endorsement, and warned of supplier dependency wherein the supplier (Capgemini) is the integrator of what HMRC does (a case of the tail wagging the dog)

He noted that suppliers are now offering "vanilla" services (ie basic services), and noted that most of the innovation is coming from SMEs and start-up businesses. Seemingly large suppliers are “tied up in knots” and they are still selling IT in verticals. Hall is of the view that working with SMEs, that have innovative products and ideas, would be beneficial.

Hall is quoted by Computer World UK:

“Our outsourcing partners have been there when we have needed them, they’ve been with us in the good times and they have been with us in the tough times. That’s a lot of what the contract was designed for in the early 2000s. The challenge is that the whole world is moving and changing around this contract.

It is really difficult to keep pace with the market. Go back to 2001, how many people would have put cloud-based services in their contracts at that point? How many people would have thought about the social networking aspect? You wouldn’t. The contract was designed to be flexible, but was designed in a completely different paradigm than we face today.

It’s also created supplier dependency – we’ve got a great partner (Capgemini), but our challenge is that our partner is the prime integrator of what we do, so a lot of the knowledge and a lot of the experience rests with the supplier. It’s a challenge about how you bring innovation into delivery.

What we have done is a lot of outsourcing-based work, but the challenge is how to bring innovation, and if I’m being slightly blunt, innovation from SIs and large vendors that are trying to sell us the vanilla type IT.

Most innovation is coming from start-ups and SMEs, it’s not coming from the large traditional vendors. So there’s a challenge about how you get those people into a large outsourcing arrangement. We recently ran an event where we brought in 12 small businesses and ran an innovation session with them for a day, and we are now taking all those 12 forward in terms of ideas they are developing.

But it’s taking that radical thought to really put those people in. If you are a small business of 10 people with a really great idea, imagine coming into an organisation like HMRC that start to talk to you about risk, challenges, availability – it all becomes quite difficult. So we are doing a lot of incubator work to try and help those businesses.”

In other words HMRC's IT future, if it wishes to succeed, lies with SME's not large suppliers.

Tax does have to be taxing.

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Hall Outlines HMRC's Challenges Ahead

Mark Hall, HMRC's outgoing Chief Information Officer (CIO) has given his incoming replacement (Mark Dearnley) some advice about the major challenges facing HMRC for when he arrives in October from Vodafone.

HMRC is currently working on systems consolidation that will reduce the number of systems serving the former Customs & Excise side of the organisation by 300. Hall states in Computing that part of the aim of the consolidation programmes has been to clear the way to put more taxes online, in a more integrated manner as HMRC aims for the "cloud".

Hall is quoted:

"We already have 200 online services. These are primarily targeted at business 'customers'. They are things like VAT, for example, or they are targeting things like self-assessment. Our ambition is to consolidate them even further and start to look at individual and personal taxpayers in the next wave of digitisation." 

HMRC hopes that the digitisation process will cut the number of paper filings and phone calls taxpayers have to make to HMRC and, therefore, will eventually save some £50M annually in administrative costs.

As per Hall:

"Going forward, we will be targeting our personal tax customers more. We have four key exemplar projects we are running in this area. The first one is PAYE [pay as you earn] online, which will ultimately deliver an online service to 39 million individual taxpayers.

You could go online to inform us that you have got a new company car, for example, so the service is targeted at providing the information you already get on paper, but in an online experience, and giving people a simple route to log simple changes and changes of circumstances.

The second one is called 'My Tax for Business', which will provide an online portal for business so that they can see all of their taxes in one place - a bit like online banking... If you're a business, you will be able to go into one place and administer all your taxes from one place.

The third one is paperless self-assessment. Self-assessment is already online, but you still receive a piece of paper asking you to file.

The final one is for agents and intermediaries, to enable them to act and support their customers in a similar way. As their customers have moved online, we need to move agents online as well - enabling the agents to do the same thing as their clients."

These projects are very ambitious, especially given that HMRC are still in the process of rolling out RTI. In Hall's opinion RTI is:

"absolutely on track".

So there we are, the new CIO has quite a task ahead of him; it is therefore very kind of Hall to help guide Dearnley in this manner.

My question to the staff members of HMRC, how are the above projects going thus far?

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.

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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"

Poacher Turned Gamekeeper

My thanks to a loyal reader who pointed me to a press release that HMRC issued yesterday, concerning the appointment of a new HMRC Chief Information Office (CIO), Mark Dearnley.

Dearnley comes from the private sector from a company that loyal readers may well have heard of........Vodafone....cough!

Sadly I see he refers to HMRC as having a "customer base", oh dear!

Anyhoo, Dearnley has quite a task ahead of him as CIO's within HMRC don't seem to last the course. Phil Pavitt moved from the role in October 2012, then left HMRC in November and his acting replacement, Mark Hall, evidently didn't cut the mustard.

Does anyone know what has happened to Mark Hall, ie is he still in HMRC?

I ask because rumours abound that he was not best pleased at being snubbed.

HMRC won't say why Hall had been denied the promotion to CIO, as per Computer Weekly:

“The CIO recruitment process was subject to fair and open competition overseen by a civil service commissioner. Following a rigorous and transparent selection process, an external candidate was chosen. We do not comment on individuals who may have been on the interview panel. Mark’s replacement as CIO will be announced in due course,”

It also appears that the role of CIO is being downgraded across Whitehall.

Interesting times ahead methinks!

Anyhoo, here is the press release from HMRC:

"HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) has announced the appointment of one of the country’s leading IT chiefs as the department’s new Chief Digital and Information Officer.

Mark Dearnley, who is currently the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Vodafone UK, is joining HMRC in October. He will take control of a £500 million-a-year IT operation that serves 45 million individuals, 4.8 million businesses and 65,000 HMRC employees. He will be responsible for implementing HMRC’s £200 million digitisation programme and accelerating the planned delivery of online services for all taxpayers. He will also lead HMRC’s physical, personnel and information security.

Mr Dearnley has been CIO at Vodafone UK since 2010 with responsibility for IT supporting 19 million customers. He led a programme to overhaul Vodafone’s business-critical information systems and was named Oracle Global Business Unit CIO of the Year in 2012 for this achievement. Mr Dearnley also restructured Vodafone’s IT operating model and introduced Cloud-based technologies into the mobile operator. 

David Gauke, Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, said:
“It is an indication of the scale and seriousness of the Government’s digital ambition that one of the UK’s most experienced CIOs is leaving the private sector to take on this major role. Mark Dearnley’s appointment to HMRC is evidence that Government has the cutting-edge challenges that can attract the very best leaders in IT to public service.”

HMRC Chief Executive, Lin Homer, added:
“Mark is an exceptionally experienced CIO, with strong leadership and change management skills as well as an accomplished technical background across a spectrum of IT disciplines. HMRC has already embarked on an ambitious programme of digitisation to provide taxpayers with modern online services and Mark is the right person to deliver that for the UK.”

Mark Dearnley said: 
“I have spent my entire career in the private sector, mostly in customer-facing businesses. But no private business in the UK can match the customer base, scale or complexity of HMRC, which makes this role irresistible. I am thrilled to have been appointed and can’t wait to get started.”

Notes for editors:

1. Mr Dearnley was recruited through a fair and open competition under the Government’s business appointment procedures for senior civil servants. The recruitment process was overseen by the Civil Service Commissioner, who led a panel that included two Permanent Secretaries and a Non-Executive Director. The UK Government Chief Operating Officer was consulted throughout the process. The appointment was approved by the Prime Minister.
2. The annual salary for this Director General role is £180,000, which is at the Senior Civil Service (SCS) 3 pay band.
3. Mr Dearnley is CIO of Vodafone UK, where his primary focus is using IT to improve the customer experience. He has worked internationally in the telecoms industry over the last decade.
4. Prior to Vodafone, Mr Dearnley spent six years at Cable and Wireless, as CIO and in other senior IT roles. He also spent three years at Boots the Chemists, first as Chief Operating Officer for the start-up of Boots.com and latterly as Programme Director.
5. He has a degree in electrical and electronic engineering from Brunel University and is a Fellow of the Institute of Engineering and Technology and British Computer Society."

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"