With reference to my comment above, I called HMRC again this afternoon. I put the phone straight on to hands free, vacuumed the office and wrote some letters. After about 30 minutes my call was answered by a very positive officer who checked and was able to confirm that the recalcitrant return had been received on the first attempt.
So all was fine in the end except for 50 minutes of lost time.
I submitted a tax return on 23 June and received a "rejected" notice. I then found that the Government gateway computer was malfunctioning at the time and the return might have gone through or might not. There was a suggestion that HMRC might send out emails to confirm receipt. I waited until today (29 June) and tried submitting the form again. This time i received a response saying that the return had been successfully submitted. Naturally, i was not confident that the return had been successfully lodged. The original rejection notice gave the number 0845 605 5999 to call if in doubt as to whether the return had been captured successfully. I called this number on which there was a recorded message saying that the number was no longer in use and that i should call 0300 200 3600. I called this number and chose from the array of options offered. I was then put on hold and listened to some music and a lady who thanked me, from time to time, for holding on. After about 5 minutes, i put the phone on speaker mode and attended to some filing and post. The music was still playing after about 15 further minutes and as i needed to leave the room briefly, I went to tur up te volume on the telephone. Unfortunately, I accidentally caught the handset and disconnected the call. I will try again later today.
My answers
Call Handling
With reference to my comment above, I called HMRC again this afternoon. I put the phone straight on to hands free, vacuumed the office and wrote some letters. After about 30 minutes my call was answered by a very positive officer who checked and was able to confirm that the recalcitrant return had been received on the first attempt.
So all was fine in the end except for 50 minutes of lost time.
HMRC Call Handling
I submitted a tax return on 23 June and received a "rejected" notice. I then found that the Government gateway computer was malfunctioning at the time and the return might have gone through or might not. There was a suggestion that HMRC might send out emails to confirm receipt. I waited until today (29 June) and tried submitting the form again. This time i received a response saying that the return had been successfully submitted. Naturally, i was not confident that the return had been successfully lodged. The original rejection notice gave the number 0845 605 5999 to call if in doubt as to whether the return had been captured successfully. I called this number on which there was a recorded message saying that the number was no longer in use and that i should call 0300 200 3600. I called this number and chose from the array of options offered. I was then put on hold and listened to some music and a lady who thanked me, from time to time, for holding on. After about 5 minutes, i put the phone on speaker mode and attended to some filing and post. The music was still playing after about 15 further minutes and as i needed to leave the room briefly, I went to tur up te volume on the telephone. Unfortunately, I accidentally caught the handset and disconnected the call. I will try again later today.
At least the filing is up to date!
Missed RTI Submissions
I shudder to think how much the RTI "improvement" is costing in terms of lost productive time.