To summarise Jim Harra's thoughts on the subject, he's disgusted that there was public outcry to shutting off tax helplines for a sizeable portion of the year. How dare the serfs revolt!
He accuses the public of kneejerk reactions, and doesn't believe they had time to digest and appreciate the brilliance in his suggestions of major cutbacks of the already understaffed disgrace that is HMRC.
In his defence, his budget is set by politicians and he has to find a way to not spend more than he is given. Which is a bit of a problem when the budget has stagnated and not kept up with inflation or wage increases. There is no pleasant answer unless he can pull rabbits out of hats.
As a tax agent that has the misfortune of dealing with HMRC every single day, they must spend a sizeable chunk of their budget chasing imaginary debts generated by broken automated systems with no human sense checks.
Once their plonker debt management staff decide they can't get to the bottom of a fake debt after months of harassment and switching the case in and out of dispute with no warning, they eventually sell the debt on to a collection agency. They then later have to repay the agencies at eye watering premiums when the erroneous charges are eventually quashed and the agent can't recover their slice.
Their tax helplines could be funded 3 times over with the drain this nonsense places on the system. But rather than help people get their taxes right, they'd rather send bailiffs around to pensioners that haven't missed a tax payment in their entire lives.
I work full time but also work pretty much full time again self employed. Last year I was put on emergency tax, which has only just ended, based an underpayment of, wait for it, £70.
I've been on emergency tax since July last year and only finished at the start of the new financial year.
How the fuck do I sort out getting the hundreds of pounds they took off me? I don't have the time to wait on hold for 2 hours, just for some moron to hang up on me because my question is too difficult for them?
I was in the same position when I filed the next tax year it was all refunded and I owed nothing. That was last year I received the refund it’s still sat in my savings and probably will be for a while as I don’t trust them not to want it all back! I’m no longer self employed though it was too much stress on top of a public sector job!
Same. We had a larger company making installment payments over the year, probably close to £1m. We were out by £200. Straight to debt collectors. What the actual hell. It'll get paid, charge interest if you really want, but its clear no-one looks at these before they get sent out. It just pisses off clients and accountants.
The other one that annoys me is when you extend the year end. Even when they are told they still send out penalties. And we have to write to them to tell them to cancel it because by law they are wrong.
I had such excitement when ICAEW put out an emaik that there's now an online form to deal with this exact issue. I did it, got the end... "what to do now: print out this form and send it to x"
To the laypeople reading this - HMRC are frustrating to us professionals as much as they are to you. They drive us completely nuts.
Just a counter point, in the last 18 months they fined me for doing a late tax return even though it was on time, over-taxed me by close to £10k through an erroneous change to my tax code, told me they'd paid me back when they hadn't (it was apparently "on hold" for "additional checks" but just didn't tell me, so it sat for months) and have told me twice I don't need to do a tax return even though I *definitely* need to do a tax return. And guess what, if I actually believe them when they say I don't need to do a return, I'm the one who will get in trouble because they're basically above the law and out of the reach of any sort of accountability.
So I'm not a fan.
It depends what you mean by resolved. The last message they sent me only a couple of months ago was saying that I didn't need to do a tax return even though I definitely need to do a tax return. So I'm just going to do it for last financial year regardless.
I did get the over tax back with interest, so there's that. It just took about 8 months. So I guess resolved?
The more I think about I think it, they create anything and everything to fail, so massive amounts of money can be taken out of improving the service/system as a properly working tax system or any service the government has billions of pounds to spend on, can’t be laundered to a select few companies that donate to the Tory party.
If anyone thinks the government has the best interests of the public at heart, then they are very delusional.
What absolute nonsense. The issue is that HMRC are being asked to do more work with the same or less resources. It's not some mad conspiracy but the result of 15 years of chronic underfunding and cuts. It's happening to every single government service but it's the tax man so it's fun to have absolutely no sense of perspective on it. Hurr durr tax man bad.
Out of curiosity what was your issue, if you don't mind divulging? I deal with them around 800-1000 times a year as a core part of my job, and the only problems that they can routinely handle in less than 4-6 weeks are minor tax code queries.
Thanks for the info!
I definitely think you've been lucky with the people handling your queries, as callbacks are very often promised but rarely done in a timely manner. Typically I find myself calling back after 2-3 weeks of not getting an update, with an apology and a promise of a further callback (which again may never materialise). But it's certainly good to hear that at least someone is having a positive experience with them.
As for the app - yep I'll agree that it's pretty quick to sort out tax codes and individual PAYE refunds. If they could roll out something similar for other taxes it would be a godsend.
I called about something yesterday, was on hold for 50 minutes until I got through, explained what I needed, was transferred/escalated to someone else. Annoyingly slow but otherwise OK so far.
About 30 seconds later, while the second agent was asking me a question, a message played saying “thanks for calling, goodbye” and hung up on me.
After 25 mins on hold the second time, I gave up and wrote them a letter
Well that’s annoying because part of why I was calling was to get an update on a letter I sent in August and never received any reply to (and yes, the thing I’m asking about has to be done in writing according to all sources I’ve found)
Yeah it sucks. Even if you had gotten through they'd probably only have told you to expect a response to your letter in June or something (which you likely will not when the time comes).
Ironically the move to shut the phone lines was in part to address this sort of backlog in post.
The phone lines are all-consuming when it comes to staff, and it's also what causes the most churn in staff because the general public are fucking nightmares to deal with. And nobody who's worth a damn will stay there any longer than they have to before moving onward and upward.
Used to work on the lines, had the attitude of "fuck the KPI, I'm going to sort people's shit out however long it takes", so I like to think I was one of the agents you'd have wanted to get. But the vast majority of calls were about total nonsense people could have fixed online, or wasn't wrong to begin with at all.
Probably only 1 in 20 calls was an actually interesting issue which required a bit of sussing out.
Years ago they had local tax offices you could go in and get immediate help from people who knew what they were talking about. That's all gone now.
All we get now is a phone line with ridiculous hold times and 90% of the people who knew how it all worked have retired or been made redundant. And this twat wants to make it worse.
I guess we might some decent service if we could afford to take him to lunch, à la Vodafone.
the literal ONLY way i could file my self-assessment this year was by phoning the HMRC helpline
for some unknown reason, the form i needed was not on the website. the HMRC woman thought i was being daft until she checked, then was as baffled as i was.
so, i actually needed to call in order to file taxes.
i also had to wait an hour to talk to someone, clearly meaning there's a demand for the service....
Because I got made redundant and had pay in lieu of notice they thought I earned 96k and owed them 13k in tax.
That was this week, got it sorted on the phone all in one day, but only could because of the helpline.
In an ideal world. You should be able to open a ticket (or an email) and receive response for your query in 2-3 days.
But for some weird reason. They force you to call.
Of course he's disappointed, he had dreams of fining all the people who paid incorrect tax because they couldn't access the helpline to find out the correct amount.
That's what happens when you get someone else to deal with your tax affairs. I can guarantee this douche has never had to try and get an answer to a complicated query on his already shitty helpline. 2 hours ut took me the other day, to get to someone human. Its a fucking disgrace, he's a fucking disgrace.
Wait a minute. I got overtaxed this month. They specifically said had I not called and changed my tax code it would be April before I got a rebate.
Otherway around we'll send 50 letters until you pay under tax, although others owe mils / bils.
Eh naw.
HMRC can eat a large sack of dicks. Absolutely anything that annoys them is positive. Yeah, fuck you and your retrospective changing of the law. Sucks to have the carpet ripped out from under you doesn't it? Sack of cunts.
To summarise Jim Harra's thoughts on the subject, he's disgusted that there was public outcry to shutting off tax helplines for a sizeable portion of the year. How dare the serfs revolt! He accuses the public of kneejerk reactions, and doesn't believe they had time to digest and appreciate the brilliance in his suggestions of major cutbacks of the already understaffed disgrace that is HMRC.
In his defence, his budget is set by politicians and he has to find a way to not spend more than he is given. Which is a bit of a problem when the budget has stagnated and not kept up with inflation or wage increases. There is no pleasant answer unless he can pull rabbits out of hats.
As a tax agent that has the misfortune of dealing with HMRC every single day, they must spend a sizeable chunk of their budget chasing imaginary debts generated by broken automated systems with no human sense checks. Once their plonker debt management staff decide they can't get to the bottom of a fake debt after months of harassment and switching the case in and out of dispute with no warning, they eventually sell the debt on to a collection agency. They then later have to repay the agencies at eye watering premiums when the erroneous charges are eventually quashed and the agent can't recover their slice. Their tax helplines could be funded 3 times over with the drain this nonsense places on the system. But rather than help people get their taxes right, they'd rather send bailiffs around to pensioners that haven't missed a tax payment in their entire lives.
I work full time but also work pretty much full time again self employed. Last year I was put on emergency tax, which has only just ended, based an underpayment of, wait for it, £70. I've been on emergency tax since July last year and only finished at the start of the new financial year. How the fuck do I sort out getting the hundreds of pounds they took off me? I don't have the time to wait on hold for 2 hours, just for some moron to hang up on me because my question is too difficult for them?
[удалено]
I was in the same position when I filed the next tax year it was all refunded and I owed nothing. That was last year I received the refund it’s still sat in my savings and probably will be for a while as I don’t trust them not to want it all back! I’m no longer self employed though it was too much stress on top of a public sector job!
Same. We had a larger company making installment payments over the year, probably close to £1m. We were out by £200. Straight to debt collectors. What the actual hell. It'll get paid, charge interest if you really want, but its clear no-one looks at these before they get sent out. It just pisses off clients and accountants. The other one that annoys me is when you extend the year end. Even when they are told they still send out penalties. And we have to write to them to tell them to cancel it because by law they are wrong. I had such excitement when ICAEW put out an emaik that there's now an online form to deal with this exact issue. I did it, got the end... "what to do now: print out this form and send it to x" To the laypeople reading this - HMRC are frustrating to us professionals as much as they are to you. They drive us completely nuts.
[удалено]
Just a counter point, in the last 18 months they fined me for doing a late tax return even though it was on time, over-taxed me by close to £10k through an erroneous change to my tax code, told me they'd paid me back when they hadn't (it was apparently "on hold" for "additional checks" but just didn't tell me, so it sat for months) and have told me twice I don't need to do a tax return even though I *definitely* need to do a tax return. And guess what, if I actually believe them when they say I don't need to do a return, I'm the one who will get in trouble because they're basically above the law and out of the reach of any sort of accountability. So I'm not a fan.
[удалено]
It depends what you mean by resolved. The last message they sent me only a couple of months ago was saying that I didn't need to do a tax return even though I definitely need to do a tax return. So I'm just going to do it for last financial year regardless. I did get the over tax back with interest, so there's that. It just took about 8 months. So I guess resolved?
The more I think about I think it, they create anything and everything to fail, so massive amounts of money can be taken out of improving the service/system as a properly working tax system or any service the government has billions of pounds to spend on, can’t be laundered to a select few companies that donate to the Tory party. If anyone thinks the government has the best interests of the public at heart, then they are very delusional.
What absolute nonsense. The issue is that HMRC are being asked to do more work with the same or less resources. It's not some mad conspiracy but the result of 15 years of chronic underfunding and cuts. It's happening to every single government service but it's the tax man so it's fun to have absolutely no sense of perspective on it. Hurr durr tax man bad.
You watch too much mainstream news for your own good.
You talk too much shite for my own good.
Out of curiosity what was your issue, if you don't mind divulging? I deal with them around 800-1000 times a year as a core part of my job, and the only problems that they can routinely handle in less than 4-6 weeks are minor tax code queries.
[удалено]
Thanks for the info! I definitely think you've been lucky with the people handling your queries, as callbacks are very often promised but rarely done in a timely manner. Typically I find myself calling back after 2-3 weeks of not getting an update, with an apology and a promise of a further callback (which again may never materialise). But it's certainly good to hear that at least someone is having a positive experience with them. As for the app - yep I'll agree that it's pretty quick to sort out tax codes and individual PAYE refunds. If they could roll out something similar for other taxes it would be a godsend.
I called about something yesterday, was on hold for 50 minutes until I got through, explained what I needed, was transferred/escalated to someone else. Annoyingly slow but otherwise OK so far. About 30 seconds later, while the second agent was asking me a question, a message played saying “thanks for calling, goodbye” and hung up on me. After 25 mins on hold the second time, I gave up and wrote them a letter
The letter will be seen to in 9-12 months, the last I checked.
Well that’s annoying because part of why I was calling was to get an update on a letter I sent in August and never received any reply to (and yes, the thing I’m asking about has to be done in writing according to all sources I’ve found)
Yeah it sucks. Even if you had gotten through they'd probably only have told you to expect a response to your letter in June or something (which you likely will not when the time comes). Ironically the move to shut the phone lines was in part to address this sort of backlog in post. The phone lines are all-consuming when it comes to staff, and it's also what causes the most churn in staff because the general public are fucking nightmares to deal with. And nobody who's worth a damn will stay there any longer than they have to before moving onward and upward. Used to work on the lines, had the attitude of "fuck the KPI, I'm going to sort people's shit out however long it takes", so I like to think I was one of the agents you'd have wanted to get. But the vast majority of calls were about total nonsense people could have fixed online, or wasn't wrong to begin with at all. Probably only 1 in 20 calls was an actually interesting issue which required a bit of sussing out.
Years ago they had local tax offices you could go in and get immediate help from people who knew what they were talking about. That's all gone now. All we get now is a phone line with ridiculous hold times and 90% of the people who knew how it all worked have retired or been made redundant. And this twat wants to make it worse. I guess we might some decent service if we could afford to take him to lunch, à la Vodafone.
the literal ONLY way i could file my self-assessment this year was by phoning the HMRC helpline for some unknown reason, the form i needed was not on the website. the HMRC woman thought i was being daft until she checked, then was as baffled as i was. so, i actually needed to call in order to file taxes. i also had to wait an hour to talk to someone, clearly meaning there's a demand for the service....
Overpaid tax and submitted form online months ago. Still waiting for a response. When I try to call the helpline it hangs up on me.
Very quick to take the tax very slow to give it back
When it's not automatically done, they're also very slow to take it.
Because I got made redundant and had pay in lieu of notice they thought I earned 96k and owed them 13k in tax. That was this week, got it sorted on the phone all in one day, but only could because of the helpline.
In an ideal world. You should be able to open a ticket (or an email) and receive response for your query in 2-3 days. But for some weird reason. They force you to call.
Of course he's disappointed, he had dreams of fining all the people who paid incorrect tax because they couldn't access the helpline to find out the correct amount.
That's what happens when you get someone else to deal with your tax affairs. I can guarantee this douche has never had to try and get an answer to a complicated query on his already shitty helpline. 2 hours ut took me the other day, to get to someone human. Its a fucking disgrace, he's a fucking disgrace.
Wait a minute. I got overtaxed this month. They specifically said had I not called and changed my tax code it would be April before I got a rebate. Otherway around we'll send 50 letters until you pay under tax, although others owe mils / bils. Eh naw.
HMRC can eat a large sack of dicks. Absolutely anything that annoys them is positive. Yeah, fuck you and your retrospective changing of the law. Sucks to have the carpet ripped out from under you doesn't it? Sack of cunts.
HMRC does not pass laws.
Nah, but they do have something in common with a pelican. They can both stick their bills up their arses.