Price of HMRC's delays in dealing with post

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As we know, our friends at HM Revenue and Customs don't look at their post for months after it is received. This has many detrimental effects on the relationships with taxpayers, and also those who have decided to come in from the cold and pay the tax they should have been paying for several years.

If I have a new client who wishes to own up to income received which should have been declared, he or she probably doesn't have a Universal Taxpayer Reference (UTR) and the only way of applying for one is by post. At the same time one wants to send a “marker” letter to HMRC to start the process of getting the individual into the system and establish it is at their own volition in case (a long shot) HMRC get their oar in first. That would theoretically increase the penalty potential which one wants to keep to a minimum.

The trouble is that the first response from HMRC will be considerably delayed. It takes months to get a UTR. It takes an age for HMRC to respond to a marker letter after they eventually read it and then allocate it to a case officer. You might say that offenders deserve what comes to them but once someone has decided to make a clean breast of things, I think it is only fair that they can get matters settled and get their tax (and interest and penalties) paid.

Of course HMRC also wait longer for their money because of their tardiness in dealing with these matters even after we get as far as being supplied with HMRC red spot stickers to mark our correspondence as more urgent than that from the hoi polloi. It just doesn't seem right, but HMRC apparently have 15 million open cases which means issues of any sort including over- and under-payment matters that haven't been resolved. They also have more unresolved than they know about with all those confessions sitting in their pile of post.

More fun with HMRC's audit of old tax liabilities

Looking at the on-line record of one of my clients the other day I noticed that a new underpayment of tax had appeared amounting to just under £500. So what, you may say. It is well known that HMRC have been trawling through their PAYE records looking for underpayments.

This one is different. Firstly, the client has been submitting Tax Returns for very many years though not until the last few with my firm's help. Secondly, the liability shown is apparently for the year ended 5th April 2000 (yes, 1999-2000) when the client self-assessed and actually (according to this record) received a repayment, which is now indicated to have been excessive.

There is no record of the underpayment on the separate Statement of Account on-line, and of course I called HM Revenue & Customs. The person I spoke to clearly thought I was mad. Her records only went back to 2003-04 (which one might expect), and as she could not see the screen I was looking at she really did seem to think I was imagining the whole thing. “It's right here in front of me” I said. “Well, I can't see it. It's not on the Statement.” “Yes, I know, but it's on my Agent's record for the client”.

There are times when if we were Basil Fawlty we would beat our head on the desk, but having had a word with her manager the HMRC person said she would send me a copy of the statement not showing this alleged underpayment and a copy of which I have already. This action will presumably allow HMRC to record that they have dealt with the issue, but probably the screen will show this supposedly uncollected tax forever. Of course I will not keep looking at it as I have other things to do, and yes, I could claim concessional relief, but there is no point as no one in HMRC can see the record even if I can.

I could rant about the time wasted, but it has given me a chuckle and reminded me of Basil with the absurdity of it all.

Royal wedding cant, hypocrisy, and the taxpayer

Wills and Kate are getting married and I wish them every happiness. I hope this Royal wedding will be a great show too, although they should have it just as they want it.

Of course there is the usual whining from commentators and journalists that the taxpayer should not have to pay for this, and the Royal Family should stump up a good deal of the cost.

Well, like it or lump it, but the Royal Family is a tremendous asset to the United Kingdom. Overseas media take a huge interest. The Royals are still worth a huge amount in terms of exports and attract millions of tourists from around the world, many of whom will come especially for the wedding. Manufacture of memorabilia is already in full swing, and William has made sure by use of her engagement ring that the Diana factor will feature heavily. Money is going to pour into our country from around the world. Yes, a lot of people are going to make serious money and yes, a lot of tax is going to be raised by the Exchequer and it will be a great deal more than the cost of running the wedding including all the policing and security. It is probably a much better money-raiser than the Olympics.

No money is going to be diverted from hospitals or welfare because the tax raised is going to be extra money. I am less a Royal fan than I was, but let us not get diverted by those who have an agenda other than their pretence of social conscience.

Let us enjoy the Royal wedding and the financial benefit the Exchequer, our clients and we will derive from it.

HMRC are broken

A pensioner who completes his own Tax Returns has been sent the Short Tax Return for the last few years. A Short Return is a paper form which has to be submitted annually by 31st October. He gets all his stuff together and sends in his Return at the beginning of August. Fairly promptly the Return is sent back to him. He is informed that as his foreign dividends exceeded £300 and are nearly £400 annually (because he had more than one account with a bank taken over by our Spanish friends, Santander) he has to fill in the full version Return. Do they enclose a full form for him to complete? No.

The pensioner telephones HMRC and after half an hour or so, gets to speak to someone, to ask for a form. None arrives.

The pensioner calls me (he is a relative) and tells me the tale. He tells me he is worried; he followed up his call with a letter on 1st September but had heard nothing. The October deadline is approaching. I told him that HMRC were unlikely to read his letter of 1st September until around Christmas. He said “I suppose I will have to try to file on-line”. Indeed that will be the case by the time I get to see him to help, otherwise he will have a £100 fine.

I don't like this blog to be a continual whinge about HMRC. However, most of the non-technical stuff I have to deal with is about this sort of nonsense where HMRC are simply not delivering any sort of service to those they have the temerity to call customers. The problem is partly about money, but many of the basic failures appear to be to do with management, organization and common sense. After all, if you tell a taxpayer he should fill in a different form, surely you should send him that form?

Good grief!

Fun with HMRC's Online Services Helpdesk

I went through the authorisation process to act for a new client, which involves entering the client's Universal Tax Reference and post code on-line, following which the client is sent an Authentication Code which he or she gives to the agent. We agents enter this code and HMRC will talk to us about the client.

I duly completed this process for a new client, but the client did not appear on my on-line list of clients on HMRC's website. I called the on-line help desk and hung on for ages (well, twelve minutes) listening to their muzak before giving up and sending an email

“We gained authorisation as agent for this client two weeks ago via the on-line procedure but he does not appear on our on-line list in the agent’s pages on the website. Could you please investigate this and append his details to our list?

Please advise when this has been done.

Thanks and regards”

Their reply:

“Dear Mr Jon Stow
Thank you for your email.

Unfortunately we need more information to progress your enquiry. Please contact the Helpdesk on 0845 60 55 999 and have to hand your Agent Code and access to a computer. Then one of our advisors will be able to assist you further.
For security reasons specific personal data may have been removed from this email.

Regards
Online Services Helpdesk”

I responded, a little irritated I admit:

“I will telephone later, but only emailed you after hanging on for 12 minutes on the telephone this morning waiting in vain to be dealt with. Can't you call me?”

Their response:

“Dear Jon Stow
Thank you for your email.

We are unable to arrange a call back, we have all advisors on incoming calls to ensure we answer as many calls as possible.

For security reasons specific personal data may have been removed from this email.

Regards
Online Services Helpdesk”

Well, firstly they may be answering as many calls as possible but clearly there are many they are not answering, including mine. Secondly, in the time it took to reply to two emails, or even only to the second one, surely they could have picked up the phone and talked to me?

HMRC are so useless and inflexible in communication now at every level. Wholesale cuts appear to have been as much at the expense of common sense as money, but no matter how much agents and taxpayers keep pointing this out, and despite initiatives such as Working Together, HMRC's meetings with tax and accountancy professionals, where it matters no one is listening; apparently not even their head honcho, Dave Hartnett who was charged with making the cuts by Gordon Brown.

Frankly it is not only costing us agents money in wasted time, the inefficiency and lack of leadership and responsible staff must be costing HMRC more than it saves in reducing their staff's ability to deal with issues to the lowest common denominator.

 Postscript: In the interest of fairness I should say that by telephoning on a Saturday I managed to speak to a helpful lady fairly promptly and it looks like the matter will be resolved, thanks to her. However, HMRC's delivery of customer service leaves a lot to be desired, not least that we would rather not be called customers.

HMRC postal delays can cause hardship

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My client has a part-time job. A year or so ago her husband was out of work for a short while. They both had to go to the JobCentre to see whether they qualified for benefit. They didn't qualify. However for some reason the JobCentre told HMRC that my client might be eligible for Jobseekers's Allowance. A year later HMRC issued a Coding to restrict allowances so that my client had to pay tax on her small salary because HMRC thought she had unemployment benefit as well as being employed.

I called HMRC and told them that my client is not in receipt of benefit and never has been. HMRC's call operative told me they will not issue a Code to refund tax that has already been deducted in error until my client obtains a letter from the JobCentre confirming that she never had any benefit. Her word and mine are not good enough. “Well” I said “you take three months to look at the post”. HMRC's person admitted this was true.

This should be a simple matter to deal with. However for an individual with small earnings HMRC's bureaucratic requirement for a letter from another Government department and refusal to take the word either of someone who completes a tax return or of her agent is quite likely to cause hardship. If HMRC was anywhere near up to date with the post it wouldn’t be a problem.

This sad state of affairs is due to cuts ordered by Gordon Brown. These cuts have made HMRC very inefficient and they fail to deliver a proper service to honest taxpayers. What hope they can catch the tax evaders? They very likely take three months to open all those letters from “A Well-wisher” grassing up the dishonest tax evaders and how long would it be before they took action? Actually a long time judging by how long it has takes to get people registered in the system when they have come clean of their own volition.

Wisdom of the aged

Image via WikipediaIn the week of his death there has been a lot written about Sir Norman Wisdom, who was a very funny man of his time, and in my book a lot funnier than many so-called comedians about today. There was at least no smut in his work where he essentially played the fall guy or fool. In real life of course he was no fool at all, but a shrewd cookie.

From the tax profession's angle we think of him as the man who lost the silver bullion case against the Inland Revenue. He put a lot of money into silver bullion with a view to making a fairly quick profit at a time in the Sixties when the pound Sterling was on the slippery slopes of devaluation. To cut a long story short he was found to be trading and liable to income tax on the profits of that trade. It is one of a few cases where one or very few transactions has been construed as a trade rather than an investment strategy. There is more technical commentary I could make but this is not the time or place.

A couple of the obituaries noted that Sir Norman  was  a “tax exile” in the Isle of Man. There has even been some criticism of him for having made his money and then going offshore to keep more of his income. Actually the Isle of Man is quite a nice place to go when you reach normal retirement age. Sir Norman only went when he was 65. It has a mild climate and quite low rainfall, especially when you realise it is sandwiched between a wetter Ireland and Lake District. Anyway, why should it be deemed immoral to retire to a nice place and pay a lower rate of tax as a bonus?

By the same token, is it immoral to work in a Middle East country with no income tax and at a high salary and (oh dear) not be earning it in one's country of origin , the UK, and therefore avoid being charged to tax by being non-resident? I would have thought it was a way of being responsible and making provision for family, and after all, if you are not present in a country in which you are not paying tax, you are not using the facilities that taxes are supposed to pay for?

Has it really come to this? Have politicians and commentators been brainwashed into criticising anyone who either accidentally or deliberately makes arrangements to pay less tax? Goodness me! If we use the facilities of the hotel we should expect to pay for them. Why is anyone expected to pay for the facilities they no longer use, especially if their hard-earned cash has in the past helped to build this facilities.

Artificial contrivances to avoid paying tax may or may not be morally questionable depending on your point of view. They probably are. Using tax free investment options must be OK since the Government allows for them in legislation. Using methods of reward that suffer lower taxes is no different from buying your food at Lidl instead of Waitrose or Fortnum and Mason, is it? We buy our petrol at the cheapest places and avoid motorway service areas. We have the choice. Why pay more?

Not being in the UK is a matter of lifestyle choice, surely? I wish politicians, some journalists and tax campaigners would grow up.