The institute’s 2016 research survey among smaller ICAEW agents about HMRC service standards was based on 350 interviews with those who either personally contacted HMRC or are responsible for a team that regularly uses HMRC services at least once a month.

Half of agents say that services over the past 12 months have not changed, while nearly a third (32%) think that they have deteriorated.

About four in 10 agents think that the ‘time’ and ‘monetary cost’ of using HMRC services has increased over the past year (43% and 39% respectively). Almost everybody else believes that these costs have remained the same (51% and 53%).

ICAEW reports agents appear to have similar frustrations with HMRC’s service quality as last year, specifically around ‘getting it right first time’ and getting information they require.

Only 20% of agents trust HMRC to get it right first time, while over a half do not (55%).

Employer payroll is perceived particularly negatively, with two thirds (67%) not seeing HMRC staff in this area getting it right first time.

Similarly, less than a third (29%) of agents find it easy to get information they need from HMRC, while many (41%) do not.

ICAEW suggests that because agents often deal with more complex issues, HMRC is failing to meet their needs in this respect. Over a half of all agents (56%) believe that HMRC is not able to deal with such queries, while just 15% think they can.

It points out that HMRC is working to improve performance in these areas, for example through the ‘once and done’ initiative, and says the survey results suggest that HMRC should seek to build on this initiative.

In addition, ICAEW suggests it is also possible that difficulties arise due to constant changes to the tax rules. For example, since the last survey there has been the marriage allowance for self assessment taxpayers and changes to collection of Class 2 and Class 4 deferment.

The research notes: ‘This makes it difficult to maintain service standards against a background of an increasingly complicated and constantly changing tax system.’

Personal tax, which operates an agent dedicated line, continues to perform better than other areas. Overall, 43% of agents are happy with the HMRC telephone service, rising to 52% in relation to personal tax, but falling to 23% for each of employer payroll and corporation tax.

However, 33% are not satisfied overall, with levels of dissatisfaction rising in relation to employer payroll (43%) and corporation tax (52%), compared to personal tax (26%).

The main challenge for both employer payroll and corporation tax lines seems to be around call waiting time. Around two thirds of agents find the call waiting time for these lines too long (64% for employer payroll and 66% for corporation tax) compared with a quarter (24%) for the personal tax agent dedicated line.

Furthermore, about six in 10 of agents focusing on employer payroll and corporation tax think that the telephone system is not quick to use and the voice recognition system does not direct them to the correct person.

The survey found the key concern about dealing with HMRC by post is, once again, the speed of response, cited by 78%. This tallies with HMRC published performance statistics which show that improvements in clearing post did not start until the early summer of 2016.

On the question of HMCR’s plans to move to making tax digital (MTD), only 29% of agents are positive about the idea, and over half (53%) are negative. Furthermore, only 15% of agents think that HMRC is supporting the role of tax agents in this move, while over half (54%) do not.

While agents are ‘digitally ready’, and 94% have some kind of software, this is not the case with many of their clients. Among those agents focussed on personal tax, only a quarter of clients maintain their records using accounting software. Most maintain paper (43%) or Excel (32%) records; the key reason being that paper or Excel is sufficient for their needs (61%) and a minority (21%) do not feel digitally ready.

Frank Haskew, ICAEW’s head of tax faculty, said: ‘The results of the survey are disappointing, especially when HMRC’s own statistics over the past year show a different picture of a steadily improving performance for the general public.

‘Getting through to the right person quickly to resolve queries and “getting it right first time” remain problem areas with our members.

‘We know that HMRC is working to address these issues and that they have been meeting their own targets for improvements, but we think that, for example, HMRC’s target for clearing 80% of post within 15 working days should be more ambitious.’

Haskew said that while HMRC has made improvements this year, there is more work to be done, especially as the UK moves to a digital tax system. He pointed out that digital services for agents still lag behind the services being offered to tax payers, which makes it difficult for agents to be the drivers for change.

‘Our survey confirms that without professional help three quarters of their clients will have problems meeting the requirements for making tax digital. It is vital that when digital services are rolled out to taxpayers, they are also rolled out to tax agents at the same time, so that the agent can see exactly what the taxpayer can see. HMRC now needs to work closely with the profession and support the valuable role that tax agents play in making the tax system work,’ Haskew said.