Acting on the latest publicised call handling statistics, HMRC have announced that “it is allocating £45 million to improve customer service.” Perhaps tellingly, these are the first performance statistics published since the end of last year. And the stats now published show a further deterioration in the number of call attempts handled by HMRC with just over 70% of calls handled in the first quarter of 2015, below HMRC’s own 80% target.

The stats published as part of this announcement thus cover call handling stats for the final two quarters of the 2014/15 year. These only cover call handling and don’t cover the full areas that performance statistics normally do.

The £45 million allocation comes from the current spending settlement and is not additional revenue from HM Treasury. It covers the cost of paying for the recruitment of around 3,000 additional staff this year and for allocating around 2,000 staff from other HMRC business areas.

The Institute continuously engages with HMRC in respect of service matters. Your feedback is vital in assisting us with the provision of evidence based feedback to support our representations to HMRC. Members can contact Leontia Doran at any time with their experience of HMRC service matters and communication protocols.