The tax authority has always been loathe to adopt email as the de facto means of communication, despite pressure to move tax services to a digital first approach, citing concerns about the lack of security of personal information, confidentiality, risks with identity verification and potential of viruses or malicious code being disseminated through attachments.

‘Email is not secure, so it’s very important that you understand the risks before you email us,’ HMRC warned. ‘We will not deal with you by email unless you tell us you accept the risks of doing so.

‘There’s no guarantee that an email received over an insecure network, like the internet, has not been altered during transit.’

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