The 2023 Adjudicator’s report confirms that despite a lower number of complaints about HMRC in 2022/23 (950 complaints compared to 1,029 in 2021/22), the upheld rate (including fully and partially upheld complaints where the AO did find something went wrong) increased to 47 percent, an increase of 15 percent.
The role of the Adjudicator was created in 1993 to introduce an independent tier of complaint handling for HMRC, and various other Government bodies. The Adjudicator’s Office (“AO”) aims to provide a free, impartial, and independent service, and to investigate all complaints within their remit, and to resolve individual complaints whilst highlighting trends in both customer service, and complaint handling. The Adjudicator seeks to continue to push the various Government departments it reports on, including HMRC, to improve quality in complaint handling, so that people will only feel the need to escalate more sensitive and complex complaints to the AO.
In its HMRC update and case studies section, the Adjudicator says that 2022/23 has seen HMRC recover its service standards post-pandemic “with varying degrees of success”. Although HMRC’s Customer Services Group has struggled with volume, and also significant pressure on resources “meaning that the recovery has slipped and is therefore ongoing.”
According to the report, recovery in HMRC’s Customer Compliance Group has been quicker leading to a “two-tier level of service being provided in HMRC, depending on where your complaint sits.”
The main reasons for taxpayer cases related to poor complaint handling by HMRC officials with the conclusion that for many, complaints were not being prioritised in HMRC’s Customer Service Group. Increasing numbers of taxpayers, often vulnerable, “are stuck in the complaints system for long periods with little or no meaningful response from HMRC.”