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HMRC cuts calls and 64-8 processing

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15th Sep 2010
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With MPs and journalists crawling all over HMRC to identify signs of operational failure, more evidence is emerging of belt-tightening and focusing staff time on high priority work.

As well as causing HMRC endless headaches with negative media coverage, the PAYE reconciliation backlog that built up since 2008-09 and erroneous coding notices produced by its new National Insurance and PAYE Service (NPS) computer has been a huge drain on the department's resources. According to the NAO report on its 2009-10 annual accounts, in January 2010 HMRC had to switch 2,400 personal tax support staff on to its PAYE recovery programme, bringing the total number of staff involved in the effort to 3,000.

At the peak of the coding notice deluge, HMRC was handling 18,000 calls a day, and with more than a million P800 notices due to go out to taxpayers to correct inaccurate tax codes and adjust payments, the volume of calls is unlikely to decrease.

Other episodes this week illustrated how day-to-day operations at the tax department are being affected by careful resource management:

  • A Central Agent Authorisation Team update signalled that staff are being redeployed from handling 64-8 agent registration forms to higher priority work, which will result in longer turnaround times for paper forms until 31 October 2010. While apologising for the inconvenience, HMRC pointed out that the online agent authorisations will not be delayed and strongly encouraged agents to use this facility. "But please don't use the online process to set up a client authorisation if you've already submitted a form 64-8 for the same client," the CAAT added. "This will cause problems with HMRC systems and may delay the authorisation process further." The agent update estimated that paper 64-8s for Self Assessment clients would take two weeks to process, and other 64-8s would take up to six weeks. Registrations for new taxpayers and self-employed could take up to eight weeks to process.
  • A separate announcement from CAAT explained that from 7 September, all calls made to the CAAT are being redirected to HMRC Contact Centres. "HMRC have analysed the telephone calls that are received directly into CAAT and have identified that the very large majority of calls are more appropriate to the Contact Centres. The reduction in the number of phone calls that CAAT handle will enable staff to concentrate on processing applications for agent authorisation, Self Assessment registration and agent registration."
  • The First Tier Tribunal decision in Schofield v HMRC provided yet another example. In response to the taxpayer's claim of "reasonable excuse" for failing to pay the second instalment of his annual payment on account, HMRC's counsel challenged his claim that he had spoken to HMRC's helpline about a Time to Pay arrangement and had waited in vain for the staff member to ring back. HMRC produced internal emails showing that because helpline staff did not have the facility to make outgoing calls, it was standard practice for them to ask callers to ring back. While hardly a sign of world-class customer service, it is an understandable economy measure that unfortunately also scuppered the taxpayer's grounds for a reasonable excuse claim.

AccountingWEB.co.uk tax editor Rebecca Benneyworth commented that the extended waiting periods for registrations was not good, but the obvious answer was to do it online.

"But for the first time HMRC is being open about this and making it clear for practitioners who can then manage client expectations accordingly. This is a great step forward and while not brilliant news, the effort to communicate is most welcome," she said.

"Also interesting are the resource management issues. Not only are staff being redeployed elsewhere at the moment, but the remaining staff will not be wasting time dealing with phone calls that really belong elsewhere. It's good example of analysing the contact and managing it better, which on limited resources is what we would hope for."

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John Stokdyk, AccountingWEB head of insight
By John Stokdyk
15th Sep 2010 16:13

Less sympathetic view from UHY Hacker Young

Even as I was working on this article, an email came in from UHY Hacker Young on the same topic. Partner Clive Gawthorpe was alarmed that the processing times for SA and self-employed registrations had gone up eight-fold. The note also mentioned HMRC's decision to stop issuing agent copies of some letters sent to taxpayers.

“It is worrying that proof that austerity measures in HMRC will lead to a further slip in standards is emerging so quickly,” Gawthorpe said.

“Considering the shock waves from the PAYE debacle you would have thought that HMRC and the Treasury would want to watch service standards very closely but it seems there are no lessons to be learnt.”

The cuts in services will have a tangible impact on taxpayers' ability to fulfil their obligations. They will lengthen the time taken to get tax rebates and create delays in dealing with the paperwork for the self-employed setting up new businesses, he argued.
 

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By Chris Wise
16th Sep 2010 08:54

64-8 Processing times

Yet I am still waiting for a SA1 and 64-8 to be processed from June.

You can only use the online if you have all the matching information, very often the client doesn't have the UTR so it's easier at that point to provide a paper form and get the UTR once it has been actioned. Plus we have had instances of the online notification not turning up within the 30 day access period. 64-8 should be priority post dealt with on day of receipt.

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John Stokdyk, AccountingWEB head of insight
By John Stokdyk
16th Sep 2010 17:51

HMRC advice on Tax Credits for agents and advisers

In the latest of a series of announcements from the CAAT, HMRC issued the following advice for those who work on clients' Tax Credits claims:

"You must use paper form 64-8 for all tax credits authorisation requests. At this time, you can’t use the online authorisation process for tax credits. To complete this form you’ll need your client’s:

National Insurance numberUnique taxpayer reference (UTR) if they have one

"Remember you can use form 64-8 to obtain authorisation for all the business areas your client wants you to act on their behalf for, for example Self Assessment, tax credits and VAT."

We'll see if we can solicit further information on how long agents can expect to wait for CAAT authorisation for these 64-8s.

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By pauljohnston
20th Sep 2010 12:18

SA1 - Notification to Revenue

A form that can not be completed on line and often the form that starts the process to produce a UTR. 

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By BIGWAL
20th Sep 2010 14:08

64-8 and online authorisations

All very well to encourage use of online authorisation, but even where this is in place HMRC often maintain no authorisation exists because they haven't had a paper 64-8.

Can we invoivc HMRC for wasting our time ?

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By nogammonsinanundoubledgame
21st Sep 2010 10:58

Conflicting advice by HMRC

If you log onto HMRC online services as an agent, and go through the process of completing an online 64-8 for Self Assessment purpose, then you are presented with the following script in the relevant heading:

"Self Assessment (SA) for Agents (including National Insurance and Tax Credits for current claimants)"

Note the "... including ... Tax Credits ..."

This seems to be at odds with the statement in

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/agents/started-tc.htm#1

"If your client wants you to deal with HMRC on their behalf for tax credits, they must formally authorise you to do so by completing a paper form 64-8" (emphasis on "paper" added)

As HMRC do not date their web pages we cannot be certain which advice predates the other, not that conflicting advice is desirable anyway.

I see that HMRC are particularly keen for agents not to submit multiple instances of 64-8, ie online and by paper, but this advice does not seem particularly geared to further that desire.

So, is there a definitive statement as to which is correct?

With kind regards

Clint Westwood

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By mikewhit
22nd Sep 2010 07:15

Version number

You make a good point there Clint - especially for a public body, HMRC should version-number its pages to show when content has changed. Certain newspapers do have a change history attached to their news pages and it does make a lot of sense for HMRC pages to have something similar, perhaps with an RSS feed of site (or subsite) changes.

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By geoff.smith
23rd Sep 2010 11:04

64-8

I sent two 64-8 forms in same envelope on 29 July.

One was processed and now appears on my agent online service, the other does not.

Sent a copy of my original letter and missing 64-8 by fax on 5 September. No action.

Telephoned on 13 September - told that faxes get dealt with as ordinary post but "I will email someone and get them to look into it".

Telephoned again today - told "currently expecting 64-8 not being dealt with until 29 December" and "nothing more I can do". When I asked to speak to a manager the guy stifled a laugh - obviously took the view "you are wasting your time there mate etc".

Spoke to manager - taken details again and says that it should be dealt with within two weeks. Emphasis on "should be"!. Also referred to online processing but that doesnt seem to be much of an option going by previous comments.

And all of this time cannot be charged to my client. Oh, by the way, I got a standard harsh letter last week because I have £250 outstanding for my tax - if I could get away from having to deal with HMRC I might be able to earn some fees to get my tax up to date!

Big question - are we now in the 21st century?

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