Author: Great Britain. National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102954241
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
Eighteen months into an ambitious programme to transform HMRC, the Department has spent £851 million and achieved estimated benefits of £2.4 billion. These benefits are mainly from activities already underway when the programme began. Changes to funding have led the Department to revise and postpone parts of the programme, and the overall benefits expected carry high levels of uncertainty.A report out today by the National Audit Office found that most of the £11.5 billion benefits are expected to come from an increased tax yield (£6.3 billion) and transaction savings to business and government (£4.1 billion). The estimate of additional tax yield is volatile and assumes collection in full. The Department has made progress in developing its systems and processes and enhanced its project and financial management skills to deliver the programme. For most programmes it has developed governance processes and set out responsibilities for managing the projects. It delivered, as planned, one major programme in the first 18 months and has implemented parts of other programmes. It is taking action to improve implementation plans and milestones, risk management and contingency plans for some other programmes. A major driver of the programme is the Department's targets to achieve efficiency savings of 5 per cent a year. Changes in funding and content of the programme during 2007-08 delayed the completion of the business cases for individual programmes. The Department has approved business cases for 10 programmes and plans to complete the remaining three over Summer 2008. Finalising the component parts of the transformation programme is a critical step, particularly as the Department expects the funding available to peak in 2008-09 and reduce thereafter.Changing the culture of the Department to become more customer-focused is an important part of the programme. In any change programme staff satisfaction might be expected to decline and recent surveys indicate morale remains at a low ebb. The Department needs to more actively demonstrate the benefits to its staff and manage the expectations of customers as many of the improvements for them are scheduled for 2011 and beyond.
HM Revenue & Customs' Transformation Programme
Author: Great Britain. National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102954241
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
Eighteen months into an ambitious programme to transform HMRC, the Department has spent £851 million and achieved estimated benefits of £2.4 billion. These benefits are mainly from activities already underway when the programme began. Changes to funding have led the Department to revise and postpone parts of the programme, and the overall benefits expected carry high levels of uncertainty.A report out today by the National Audit Office found that most of the £11.5 billion benefits are expected to come from an increased tax yield (£6.3 billion) and transaction savings to business and government (£4.1 billion). The estimate of additional tax yield is volatile and assumes collection in full. The Department has made progress in developing its systems and processes and enhanced its project and financial management skills to deliver the programme. For most programmes it has developed governance processes and set out responsibilities for managing the projects. It delivered, as planned, one major programme in the first 18 months and has implemented parts of other programmes. It is taking action to improve implementation plans and milestones, risk management and contingency plans for some other programmes. A major driver of the programme is the Department's targets to achieve efficiency savings of 5 per cent a year. Changes in funding and content of the programme during 2007-08 delayed the completion of the business cases for individual programmes. The Department has approved business cases for 10 programmes and plans to complete the remaining three over Summer 2008. Finalising the component parts of the transformation programme is a critical step, particularly as the Department expects the funding available to peak in 2008-09 and reduce thereafter.Changing the culture of the Department to become more customer-focused is an important part of the programme. In any change programme staff satisfaction might be expected to decline and recent surveys indicate morale remains at a low ebb. The Department needs to more actively demonstrate the benefits to its staff and manage the expectations of customers as many of the improvements for them are scheduled for 2011 and beyond.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102954241
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
Eighteen months into an ambitious programme to transform HMRC, the Department has spent £851 million and achieved estimated benefits of £2.4 billion. These benefits are mainly from activities already underway when the programme began. Changes to funding have led the Department to revise and postpone parts of the programme, and the overall benefits expected carry high levels of uncertainty.A report out today by the National Audit Office found that most of the £11.5 billion benefits are expected to come from an increased tax yield (£6.3 billion) and transaction savings to business and government (£4.1 billion). The estimate of additional tax yield is volatile and assumes collection in full. The Department has made progress in developing its systems and processes and enhanced its project and financial management skills to deliver the programme. For most programmes it has developed governance processes and set out responsibilities for managing the projects. It delivered, as planned, one major programme in the first 18 months and has implemented parts of other programmes. It is taking action to improve implementation plans and milestones, risk management and contingency plans for some other programmes. A major driver of the programme is the Department's targets to achieve efficiency savings of 5 per cent a year. Changes in funding and content of the programme during 2007-08 delayed the completion of the business cases for individual programmes. The Department has approved business cases for 10 programmes and plans to complete the remaining three over Summer 2008. Finalising the component parts of the transformation programme is a critical step, particularly as the Department expects the funding available to peak in 2008-09 and reduce thereafter.Changing the culture of the Department to become more customer-focused is an important part of the programme. In any change programme staff satisfaction might be expected to decline and recent surveys indicate morale remains at a low ebb. The Department needs to more actively demonstrate the benefits to its staff and manage the expectations of customers as many of the improvements for them are scheduled for 2011 and beyond.
Reducing costs in HM Revenue & Customs
Author: Great Britain: National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102969900
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
HM Revenue & Customs faces a significant challenge in securing a £1.6 billion reduction in running costs over the next four years, at the same time as increasing tax revenues, improving customer service and achieving reductions in welfare payments. HMRC has reported savings of some £1.4 billion since 2005. To achieve its cost reductions it plans to implement 24 change projects and other measures including savings in the provision of IT services, improvements in productivity, reduced sickness absence and headcount reductions. The size and shape of HMRC will change substantially as it reduces staff numbers by 10,000 and significantly reduces the number of offices it operates. HMRC has established a clear vision and specified operational priorities and revenue targets. It has not yet sufficiently defined the business performance and customer service it intends to achieve by 2015. It has good information on the different costs it incurs but only limited information on the cost of its end-to-end processes and on the cost of servicing different customers groups. It also has a limited understanding of the link between the cost and value of its activities. This has restricted its ability to assess fully the impact of cost reductions on business performance. HMRC has made no allowance in its cost reduction plans for under-delivery or slippage, and currently has no reserve of proposals on which to draw. HMRC has begun to implement its cost reduction plans but has not yet assessed all the dependencies between projects and the critical path for delivery.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102969900
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
HM Revenue & Customs faces a significant challenge in securing a £1.6 billion reduction in running costs over the next four years, at the same time as increasing tax revenues, improving customer service and achieving reductions in welfare payments. HMRC has reported savings of some £1.4 billion since 2005. To achieve its cost reductions it plans to implement 24 change projects and other measures including savings in the provision of IT services, improvements in productivity, reduced sickness absence and headcount reductions. The size and shape of HMRC will change substantially as it reduces staff numbers by 10,000 and significantly reduces the number of offices it operates. HMRC has established a clear vision and specified operational priorities and revenue targets. It has not yet sufficiently defined the business performance and customer service it intends to achieve by 2015. It has good information on the different costs it incurs but only limited information on the cost of its end-to-end processes and on the cost of servicing different customers groups. It also has a limited understanding of the link between the cost and value of its activities. This has restricted its ability to assess fully the impact of cost reductions on business performance. HMRC has made no allowance in its cost reduction plans for under-delivery or slippage, and currently has no reserve of proposals on which to draw. HMRC has begun to implement its cost reduction plans but has not yet assessed all the dependencies between projects and the critical path for delivery.
HM Revenue & Customs
Author: Great Britain. National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102954920
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 52
Book Description
In 2007-08, HMRC received more than a quarter of the 4 million Tax Credit renewals forms in July (the renewal deadline) and it processed half of the 8.2 million Income Tax Self Assessment returns during January to March. At busier times customers experience delays on their correspondence and receive a less responsive service. In the lead up to the Income Tax Self Assessment deadline in January 2008, HMRC answered just two thirds of the 7 million telephone calls made to its contact centres. By encouraging more customers to file tax returns online and removing the need for some returns, HMRC has smoothed peaks in workload and released resources of £7 million a year. The peak in Tax Credit renewal work has, however, increased as the deadline has been brought forward to reduce overpayments. Using different processing targets throughout the year and giving customers more information about how long their information will take to process during peak periods could help spread work out throughout the year. During busy periods, HMRC 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 HMRC also experiences increased staff sickness absence. The experience of HMRC and other organisations is that between 15 per cent and 40 per cent of contact with customers is avoidable. Reducing the number of avoidable calls by 15 per cent could release resources of up to £23 million a year or 11 per cent of its annual spending on contact centres.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102954920
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 52
Book Description
In 2007-08, HMRC received more than a quarter of the 4 million Tax Credit renewals forms in July (the renewal deadline) and it processed half of the 8.2 million Income Tax Self Assessment returns during January to March. At busier times customers experience delays on their correspondence and receive a less responsive service. In the lead up to the Income Tax Self Assessment deadline in January 2008, HMRC answered just two thirds of the 7 million telephone calls made to its contact centres. By encouraging more customers to file tax returns online and removing the need for some returns, HMRC has smoothed peaks in workload and released resources of £7 million a year. The peak in Tax Credit renewal work has, however, increased as the deadline has been brought forward to reduce overpayments. Using different processing targets throughout the year and giving customers more information about how long their information will take to process during peak periods could help spread work out throughout the year. During busy periods, HMRC 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 HMRC also experiences increased staff sickness absence. The experience of HMRC and other organisations is that between 15 per cent and 40 per cent of contact with customers is avoidable. Reducing the number of avoidable calls by 15 per cent could release resources of up to £23 million a year or 11 per cent of its annual spending on contact centres.
Progress on Reducing Costs
Author: Great Britain: National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102981278
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 48
Book Description
In challenging circumstances in 2011-12, HM Revenue and Customs maintained its performance in key strategic areas at the same time as reducing its staff and spending. The challenge for HMRC will be to make more and deeper reductions over the spending review period while increasing tax revenues, improving customer service and introducing its 'real time information' project and changes to benefits and credits. HMRC made £296 million of savings in 2011-12, exceeding its target by 19 per cent. This is about a third of the total savings it is required to make over the four years of the spending review period. However, HMRC expects these projects to save £162 million less over the spending review period than when the NAO last reported on this subject, in July 2011. This is partly because its forecasts are now more refined and realistic, and partly because, as some projects took longer to start, the benefits will take longer to be realised. HMRC has strengthened how it manages its change programme in ways that address NAO and Public Accounts Committee recommendations. The Department has also started to address the recommendations that it should improve its understanding of interdependencies between projects and of the cost and value of its activities though it has more to do in these areas. At September 2012, HMRC was on track to exceed its 2012-13 cost reduction target by £29 million. However, the reduction in planned savings being delivered by change projects means that HMRC needs to find £66 million more savings than it originally planned through other initiatives
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102981278
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 48
Book Description
In challenging circumstances in 2011-12, HM Revenue and Customs maintained its performance in key strategic areas at the same time as reducing its staff and spending. The challenge for HMRC will be to make more and deeper reductions over the spending review period while increasing tax revenues, improving customer service and introducing its 'real time information' project and changes to benefits and credits. HMRC made £296 million of savings in 2011-12, exceeding its target by 19 per cent. This is about a third of the total savings it is required to make over the four years of the spending review period. However, HMRC expects these projects to save £162 million less over the spending review period than when the NAO last reported on this subject, in July 2011. This is partly because its forecasts are now more refined and realistic, and partly because, as some projects took longer to start, the benefits will take longer to be realised. HMRC has strengthened how it manages its change programme in ways that address NAO and Public Accounts Committee recommendations. The Department has also started to address the recommendations that it should improve its understanding of interdependencies between projects and of the cost and value of its activities though it has more to do in these areas. At September 2012, HMRC was on track to exceed its 2012-13 cost reduction target by £29 million. However, the reduction in planned savings being delivered by change projects means that HMRC needs to find £66 million more savings than it originally planned through other initiatives
The compliance and enforcement programme
Author: Great Britain: National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102975420
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
The Compliance and Enforcement Programme , a major HMRC programme to improve the way it tackles evasion, delivered £4.32 billion of additional tax yield between 2006 and 2011. It also forecasts that it will generate an additional £8.87 billion of yield between 2011-12 and 2014-15. It also reduced staff numbers and introduced a range of improvements in its compliance work. The Department has introduced new capabilities, notably the use of IT to identify incidences of evasion more effectively, although it is not yet exploiting the full potential of the new systems. It also had to defer and reduce the scope of projects to keep within annual budgetary limits, leading to reductions in benefits. The Compliance and Enforcement Programme cost £387 million to 2011-12 and was made up of over 40 projects. It aimed to increase compliance yield - the measure of additional tax arising from compliance work - by £4.56 billion between 2006-2011. However, HMRC will not achieve all of the Programme's forecast benefits because of changes to scope or slippage in delivering projects, as well as over-optimism in its forecasts. HMRC did not routinely measure the impact of the Programme on customer experience and it could achieve better value for money from its investment in compliance work by improved understanding of the impact of individual projects and ensuring that its staff have the capacity to exploit new systems to the full
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102975420
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 40
Book Description
The Compliance and Enforcement Programme , a major HMRC programme to improve the way it tackles evasion, delivered £4.32 billion of additional tax yield between 2006 and 2011. It also forecasts that it will generate an additional £8.87 billion of yield between 2011-12 and 2014-15. It also reduced staff numbers and introduced a range of improvements in its compliance work. The Department has introduced new capabilities, notably the use of IT to identify incidences of evasion more effectively, although it is not yet exploiting the full potential of the new systems. It also had to defer and reduce the scope of projects to keep within annual budgetary limits, leading to reductions in benefits. The Compliance and Enforcement Programme cost £387 million to 2011-12 and was made up of over 40 projects. It aimed to increase compliance yield - the measure of additional tax arising from compliance work - by £4.56 billion between 2006-2011. However, HMRC will not achieve all of the Programme's forecast benefits because of changes to scope or slippage in delivering projects, as well as over-optimism in its forecasts. HMRC did not routinely measure the impact of the Programme on customer experience and it could achieve better value for money from its investment in compliance work by improved understanding of the impact of individual projects and ensuring that its staff have the capacity to exploit new systems to the full
HM Revenue & Customs
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215039910
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 72
Book Description
HM Revenue & Customs faces a huge challenge to resolve long-standing problems with the administration of PAYE and tax credits while making substantial reductions to its running costs. The Department needs to stabilise its administration of PAYE following the problems encountered after a new processing system was introduced in 2009. It also needs to recover a significant amount of outstanding tax credit debt while minimising the amount of new debt being accumulated. While £900 million extra has been allocated to tackle tax avoidance, at the same time, following the 2010 Spending Review, the Department is required to reduce its running costs by £1.6 billion over the next four years. The Department has made progress in improving PAYE administration since the Committee's last examination of this area in 2010. However, as a consequence of the Department's handling of the 2009 transition to the new PAYE Service, it has had to forgo up to £1.2 billion of income tax underpaid from 2004-05 to 2009-10. Under current plans, it will take until 2013 before all processing backlogs are cleared and the new PAYE Service is operating as intended. The Department needs to focus on improving data quality in particular to sustain progress in PAYE administration. Without a clear plan for reducing tax credit debt, the level of uncollected debt will continue to rise to an estimated £7.4 billion by 2014-15. The Department has been forced to acknowledge that much of this debt will never be recovered from tax credit claimants, and recently wrote off some £1.1 billion of debt dating back to the introduction of the scheme.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215039910
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 72
Book Description
HM Revenue & Customs faces a huge challenge to resolve long-standing problems with the administration of PAYE and tax credits while making substantial reductions to its running costs. The Department needs to stabilise its administration of PAYE following the problems encountered after a new processing system was introduced in 2009. It also needs to recover a significant amount of outstanding tax credit debt while minimising the amount of new debt being accumulated. While £900 million extra has been allocated to tackle tax avoidance, at the same time, following the 2010 Spending Review, the Department is required to reduce its running costs by £1.6 billion over the next four years. The Department has made progress in improving PAYE administration since the Committee's last examination of this area in 2010. However, as a consequence of the Department's handling of the 2009 transition to the new PAYE Service, it has had to forgo up to £1.2 billion of income tax underpaid from 2004-05 to 2009-10. Under current plans, it will take until 2013 before all processing backlogs are cleared and the new PAYE Service is operating as intended. The Department needs to focus on improving data quality in particular to sustain progress in PAYE administration. Without a clear plan for reducing tax credit debt, the level of uncollected debt will continue to rise to an estimated £7.4 billion by 2014-15. The Department has been forced to acknowledge that much of this debt will never be recovered from tax credit claimants, and recently wrote off some £1.1 billion of debt dating back to the introduction of the scheme.
HM Revenue and Customs
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215034376
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 52
Book Description
In January 2004, the Inland Revenue entered into a contract with Capgemini to provide IT services to support the Department's business. The contract, known as ASPIRE (Acquiring Strategic Partners for the Inland Revenue), replaced two previous contracts with EDS and Accenture and, following the merger of the Inland Revenue and HM Customs & Excise in 2005, the latter's IT services contract with Fujitsu was incorporated within ASPIRE in April 2006. This change from one supplier to another was the first of this scale in the public sector, and the contract provides wider lessons for the public sector in re-competing major contracts, particularly relating to the payment of transition costs. The cost of the contract has risen from £2.83 billion to £8.5 billion over the 10 year term. Following on from a NAO report on this topic (HCP 938, session 2005-06; ISBN 9780102939170) published in July 2006, the Committee's report examines the procurement process, the transition to a new supplier and the performance of the ASPIRE contract to date. Findings include: i) before concluding the deal, the Department should have evaluated bids against a range of demands for IT services and analysed the effect of different scenarios on suppliers' prices and profit margins; ii) it should have evaluated the performance of consultants and the lessons to be learned from their use, not only for their own benefit but for that of other departments; iii) by contributing to bid costs and paying transition costs to secure competition for the contract, the Department incurred a premium of £51.9 million; iv) it should set more challenging performance targets to impose sufficient discipline on suppliers; and v) the Government should not be placed in the invidious position of having to commission further work from a contractor in order to recover compensation for underperformance.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215034376
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 52
Book Description
In January 2004, the Inland Revenue entered into a contract with Capgemini to provide IT services to support the Department's business. The contract, known as ASPIRE (Acquiring Strategic Partners for the Inland Revenue), replaced two previous contracts with EDS and Accenture and, following the merger of the Inland Revenue and HM Customs & Excise in 2005, the latter's IT services contract with Fujitsu was incorporated within ASPIRE in April 2006. This change from one supplier to another was the first of this scale in the public sector, and the contract provides wider lessons for the public sector in re-competing major contracts, particularly relating to the payment of transition costs. The cost of the contract has risen from £2.83 billion to £8.5 billion over the 10 year term. Following on from a NAO report on this topic (HCP 938, session 2005-06; ISBN 9780102939170) published in July 2006, the Committee's report examines the procurement process, the transition to a new supplier and the performance of the ASPIRE contract to date. Findings include: i) before concluding the deal, the Department should have evaluated bids against a range of demands for IT services and analysed the effect of different scenarios on suppliers' prices and profit margins; ii) it should have evaluated the performance of consultants and the lessons to be learned from their use, not only for their own benefit but for that of other departments; iii) by contributing to bid costs and paying transition costs to secure competition for the contract, the Department incurred a premium of £51.9 million; iv) it should set more challenging performance targets to impose sufficient discipline on suppliers; and v) the Government should not be placed in the invidious position of having to commission further work from a contractor in order to recover compensation for underperformance.
Administration and effectiveness of HM Revenue and Customs
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Treasury Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215561039
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 206
Book Description
This report identified serious concerns in a number of areas, including: unacceptable difficulties contacting HMRC by phone during peak periods; endemic delays in responding to post; and an increasing focus on online communication that may exclude those without reliable internet access. The Committee recognises that the Department performs a crucial role and operates under significant external pressures including continuing resource reductions, deficiencies in tax legislation and the legacy of the merger. It also acknowledges the commitment of management to tackling these problems and the dedication and professionalism of HMRC staff. However, it concluded that the Department has a difficult few years ahead of it, as it attempts to improve its service. The Committee makes recommendations in the following areas: Improving the service provided by contact centres; providing robust alternative to online contact; ensuring greater awareness of the impact of process changes on individuals and businesses; ensuring reductions in resources are managed in a way that is commensurate with the enabling IT and process improvements and minimises the loss of Departmental tax expertise; reviewing the division of responsibilities between HMRC and HM Treasury in relation to making tax policy, to ensure practical considerations are taken into account at the earliest possible stage; better targeting of letters that threaten serious consequences against individuals; having the National Audit Office externally audit preparations for Real-time Information, to ensure Ministers can be held accountable for progress against the Government's ambitious timetable; and examining how the Department can achieve better accountability around the settlement of large tax cases
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215561039
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 206
Book Description
This report identified serious concerns in a number of areas, including: unacceptable difficulties contacting HMRC by phone during peak periods; endemic delays in responding to post; and an increasing focus on online communication that may exclude those without reliable internet access. The Committee recognises that the Department performs a crucial role and operates under significant external pressures including continuing resource reductions, deficiencies in tax legislation and the legacy of the merger. It also acknowledges the commitment of management to tackling these problems and the dedication and professionalism of HMRC staff. However, it concluded that the Department has a difficult few years ahead of it, as it attempts to improve its service. The Committee makes recommendations in the following areas: Improving the service provided by contact centres; providing robust alternative to online contact; ensuring greater awareness of the impact of process changes on individuals and businesses; ensuring reductions in resources are managed in a way that is commensurate with the enabling IT and process improvements and minimises the loss of Departmental tax expertise; reviewing the division of responsibilities between HMRC and HM Treasury in relation to making tax policy, to ensure practical considerations are taken into account at the earliest possible stage; better targeting of letters that threaten serious consequences against individuals; having the National Audit Office externally audit preparations for Real-time Information, to ensure Ministers can be held accountable for progress against the Government's ambitious timetable; and examining how the Department can achieve better accountability around the settlement of large tax cases
Departmental report 2007 H.M. Revenue & Customs
Author: Great Britain: H.M. Revenue & Customs
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0101710720
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 86
Book Description
Dated May 2007. On cover: Integrating and growing stronger. Spring 2007
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0101710720
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 86
Book Description
Dated May 2007. On cover: Integrating and growing stronger. Spring 2007
Customer Service Performance
Author: Great Britain: National Audit Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102980561
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 44
Book Description
This report recognizes that HMRC has restored customer service levels from a low point in 2010, when problems with the new National Insurance and PAYE system increased the number of queries. HMRC has now dealt with long-term backlogs by employing 2,500 temporary staff, enhancing phone technology and improving productivity. In 2011-12, HMRC answered 74 per cent of phone calls, against an interim target of 58 per cent. This level of service is nevertheless low. So far in 2012-13, HMRC has improved its handling of post but its performance in handling calls has been varied. Depending on the tariff they pay their phone company, customers are charged from when their call is connected even if they are held in a queue. The NAO estimates that it cost customers £33 million in call charges while they are in the queue. Most of HMRC's numbers are still 0845 numbers which result in high call charges for some customers. It is, however, investigating alternatives. NAO analysis indicates that, by the end of 2012-13 and through 2013-14, HMRC could achieve its target of answering 90 per cent of calls. However, by 2014-15, HMRC will have reduced numbers of contact centre staff so will need to redeploy large numbers of back-office processing staff to answer telephones. There is also uncertainty about the impact on call volumes of large-scale changes, such as the introduction of Real Time Information and the transition to universal credit.
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780102980561
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 44
Book Description
This report recognizes that HMRC has restored customer service levels from a low point in 2010, when problems with the new National Insurance and PAYE system increased the number of queries. HMRC has now dealt with long-term backlogs by employing 2,500 temporary staff, enhancing phone technology and improving productivity. In 2011-12, HMRC answered 74 per cent of phone calls, against an interim target of 58 per cent. This level of service is nevertheless low. So far in 2012-13, HMRC has improved its handling of post but its performance in handling calls has been varied. Depending on the tariff they pay their phone company, customers are charged from when their call is connected even if they are held in a queue. The NAO estimates that it cost customers £33 million in call charges while they are in the queue. Most of HMRC's numbers are still 0845 numbers which result in high call charges for some customers. It is, however, investigating alternatives. NAO analysis indicates that, by the end of 2012-13 and through 2013-14, HMRC could achieve its target of answering 90 per cent of calls. However, by 2014-15, HMRC will have reduced numbers of contact centre staff so will need to redeploy large numbers of back-office processing staff to answer telephones. There is also uncertainty about the impact on call volumes of large-scale changes, such as the introduction of Real Time Information and the transition to universal credit.