HMRC and VOA’s response to the Adjudicator’s Office 2021 annual report
HM Revenue and Customs' and the Valuation Office Agency’s response to the Adjudicator's Office annual report published in June 2021.
The Adjudicator’s Office annual report was published in June 2021. The report highlights learning based on insight from investigated complaints and real-time tracking that was conducted in 2020 to 2021.
This is the department’s – HMRC and its executive agency, the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) – published response to the Adjudicator’s annual report. It includes an update on commitments made in the department’s response to the 2020 annual report and a response to the feedback in the 2021 report.
As the Adjudicator notes, this has been an unprecedented year as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and EU Exit. Throughout this time, HMRC worked hard to keep its core services running alongside its COVID-19 financial support role whilst also responding to real-time customer insight and feedback to improve its services.
Working together
The department is pleased that the Adjudicator’s 2020 to 2021 annual report acknowledges the significant improvements in collaboration and engagement at all levels across HMRC and the VOA.
HMRC is committed to learn from customer complaints and greatly values the feedback and challenges received from the Adjudicator and her office. This has been demonstrated by HMRC resolving all the outstanding issues raised by the Adjudicator historically, enabling the department to move to a more proactive approach to learning from complaints.
The department would like to thank the former Head of Office, Jane Brothwood, for her valued contributions during her time at the Adjudicator’s Office. In September 2020 the Adjudicator’s Office welcomed its new Head of Office Mike McMahon. The department looks forward to continuing to work collaboratively with Mike McMahon to use insight from complaints to improve customer experience.
HMRC is pleased to see the publication of the Adjudicator’s Office latest 3-year Business Plan in September 2021 and is supportive of the new corporate aims.
Learning from complaints
The Adjudicator’s annual report highlights the progress made by HMRC and the VOA to recognise and promote the importance of learning from complaints. The report notes that over the last year, learning from complaints has become ‘further reaching and more ambitious’.
The Complaints Insight Board is well established in driving forward changes to practice, policy, culture and learning from complaints.
In July 2020, HMRC published the Tax Administration Strategy which sets out the government’s vision for the future of tax administration in the UK. This 10-year strategy is designed to improve HMRC’s resilience, effectiveness and support for taxpayers and delivers a trusted, modern tax system. In addition, HMRC published its new Charter in November 2020.
The Charter standards are:
- getting things right
- making things easy
- being responsive
- treating you fairly
- being aware of your personal situation
- recognising that someone can represent you
- keeping your data secure
How HMRC handles and responds to complaints is fundamental to the delivery of the Charter. Collaboratively working with the Adjudicator to embrace complaints insight as a learning opportunity supports this ambition.
HMRC continues its work to improve our complaints processes and learning improvement and is pleased that the progress made is recognised within the Adjudicator’s 2021 annual report.
The department has undertaken the following activity to improve the complaints journey and also improve customer experience:
- improvements to the online complaints form to make it easier for customers to submit a digital complaint
- improving customer communications by updating the Complain about HMRC pages on GOV.UK and keeping the customer informed on the progress of their complaint using text message and letters
- embedding a standards framework for the end-to-end assurance of ‘One-to-Many’ activity. This activity involves sending common communications to help customers get their tax right. This includes digital and non-digital communications which could be sent via a tax agent or third party. The One-to-Many Compliance Advisory Board, a forum made up of members from organisations covering both customers represented by agents and those without agents, has been created to provide external input on planned activity
- reviewing the departmental response to complaints that have taken longer to resolve
- jointly with the Adjudicator engaging across HMRC on the learning themes raised in the Adjudicator’s reports and feedback on complaints
In her annual report, the Adjudicator noted the progress made by HMRC to respond to the findings of the Policy Formulation Thematic Report. A working group has been established since December 2020 to take forward the recommendations and improve engagement and collaboration across key areas in the department. The Adjudicator’s Office continues to be informed of the progress of the group on the work to address the recommendations within the report.
Customer focus
HMRC’s new Charter standards published in November 2020, outline the service and standard of behaviour that customers can expect when interacting with the department. The Adjudicator’s membership at the Customer Experience Committee ensures coherence between customer complaints, wider customer experience and HMRC’s strategic objectives, as well as ensuring the department delivers against the Charter commitments.
HMRC continues to work with the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman and other government departments to develop a shared vision for complaint handling through the Complaint Standards Framework. The framework sets out a single set of standards for colleagues across government to follow and provides a benchmark to help leaders learn from complaints. HMRC and the VOA continue to support this framework as it complements the ethos of the Charter.
HMRC continues to embed Compliance Professional Standards within the department, with current focus on the work of HMRC’s Customer Compliance Group. The Standards are grounded in the principles of the HMRC Charter and set the standards for how caseworkers should handle their compliance work and interact with customers.
Complaint handling
The annual report highlights 2 areas where the department can improve the way it handles complaints. These are:
- the relatively high number of complaints escalating to the Adjudicator prematurely
- examples of where HMRC should have identified customers who need extra help
To help reduce the number of complaints prematurely escalated to the Adjudicator’s Office, HMRC has updated its customer correspondence and complaints guidance pages on GOV.UK to clearly outline to customers the department’s complaints process. The department continues to work closely with the Adjudicator’s Office to agree further action to reduce the number of complaints escalated too soon and a working group has been established to support this.
Using case studies, the Adjudicator’s Office identified instances HMRC could have improved its support for customers who need extra help. These case studies have been discussed with operational colleagues to ensure lessons are learnt and to prevent similar complaints from recurring. In November 2020, HMRC published its new principles of support for customers who need extra help alongside the new Charter. These principles demonstrate HMRC’s commitment to provide tailored support to customers who may need extra help.
HMRC’s support for customers who need extra help is continuously improving and we have made good progress against the principles of support for customers who need extra help. We have:
- published new guidance for customers on GOV.UK. This includes: a new HMRC Compliance Checks help and support. This explains the compliance check process and the help customers and agents can get, during and after the compliance check
- refined the GOV.UK guidance on getting help from HMRC if you need extra support, adding a link to ‘Breathing Space’ which signposts customers to the support available if they are experiencing financial hardship
- worked closely with the debt advice sector to implement debt advice referral arrangements for customers who may be experiencing financial hardship. Our new debt advice referral pilot developed in collaboration with the Money and Pensions Service went live in December 2020
- improved guidance for our compliance colleagues and developed a compliance introductory pack which signposts customers to the independent help and support available, for example from the Voluntary and Community Sector
The department’s 2020 response noted that HMRC’s Customer Services Group (CSG) piloted a new operating model to streamline existing processes and ensure customer issues are identified and resolved at the first opportunity. The department’s ambition to rollout the model was paused due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Following the success of the pilot the department is now looking to trial this within another area in CSG.
Performance
The annual report highlighted that the number of HMRC complaints escalated to the Adjudicator had increased in 2020 to 2021 compared to 2019 to 2020. This is largely accounted for by complaints related to the COVID-19 support schemes. The new COVID-19 support schemes have seen HMRC pay out more than £96.4 billion through its 2 main schemes - the Coronavirus Job Support Scheme has supported 11.7 million jobs, and the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme has seen 10.4 million claims (figures accurate as of September 2021).
The upheld rate for these complaints was lower than average partly due to the clear eligibility conditions for the COVID-19 schemes. HMRC did take a learning approach to its complaint handling by using this feedback to make it easier for the customers to understand when they were eligible for a grant, and for advisers to administer the new COVID-19 support schemes. It is worth noting that over 98% of HMRC complaints continue to be resolved prior to escalation to the Adjudicator’s Office.
As part of the department’s ambition for the future of complaint handling, HMRC is conducting a review into how complaints are measured, analysed and categorised with a view to further improving complaints handling and the use of insight. This approach will be embedded into the new case management system CHART (Complaints Handling, Analysis and Reporting Tool) which is being jointly developed with the Adjudicator’s Office.
For the VOA, the total number of complaints escalated to the Adjudicator decreased to 46 in 2020 to 2021 compared to 54 in 2019 to 2020, a consistent 6% of total complaints received each year.
As part of the VOA’s drive to keep improving complaint handling several new initiatives have been introduced this year. These include ring-fencing complaints on particular issues to ensure consistency of handling and responses and developing the role of the quality control manager. All of which are helping to drive greater accuracy and ensure the best outcome for the customer.
The VOA continues to work closely with HMRC by attending the Complaints Insight Board and welcomes both the insight the Adjudicator’s Office provide and their recommendations for improvements.