Unnecessary job cuts at HMRC led to customers spending four million hours on hold in 2015/16 according to evidence given to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) based on customer service reports from National Audit Office (NAO)
NAO reported 10,800 job losses at HMRC since 2010 with 5,600 (21%) jobs lost in 2014/15. In mid-2015 call response times declined rapidly due to the staff numbers cut that saved HMRC £257m.
HMRC recruited 2,400 additional staff to improve the services which left some customers waiting up to 47 minutes on hold.
Ruth Owen, HMRC director general for customer service, explained to the MPs that 55% of people left due to ‘natural wastage’, some were deployed into other areas of HMRC and the remaining 2,500 were made redundant.
Caroline Flint, MP for Don Valley, asked if 2,500 people were made redundant why HMRC then went on to employ 2,400 additional staff.
Amongst the MPs there was confusion as to why the staff made redundant, who already had expertise in tax and other areas, could not be transferred onto the phones.
Owen said: ‘the reason we lost some staff with skills was down to the footprint of our contact centres. Some were also on older contracts, which meant they did not work evenings and weekends, and those are the periods when increasingly our customers want to be able to contact us.’
In 2015, 88% of the 20-24 year olds in HMRC worked full-time and 21.7% of 65+ worked full-time. However, 78.3% aged 65+ worked part-time but only 12% of 20-24 year olds worked part-time hours, according to HMRC’s workforce diversity data for 2014/15.
Seeing as the majority of HMRC’s part-time staff are predominantly older it is unlikely they would work the later hours or weekends therefore, it was decided to bring in the 2,400 additional staff.
NAO found that one in five callers last year (4.2m) hung up after waiting for an average of 16 minutes each.
However, it reports that 72% of calls last year were answered.
HMRC trace at which point calls are hung up to determine if the call has been answered appropriately.
Owen said: ‘a large number of people phone about tax credits and when the next payment is. At bank holidays we put on a message saying “if you expect to be paid on a Monday the payment will actually arrive on the Friday” we then consider this call as answered as they received the information they phoned up for.’
Currently HMRC operates Monday to Friday from 8am-8pm and on Saturday from 8am-4pm.
To view the full hearing click here.
