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HMRC staff quitting in highest numbers for four years

06 - 11 - 2013

Workers are resigning from jobs at HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) in their highest numbers for four years, following pressure from the government to cut costs and improve performance.

A total of 1,697 staff left in 2012-13, the highest number since 2008-09, according to the accountancy group, UHY Hacker Young.

 

The personal tax department experienced the greatest number of losses, with 1,238 staff members resigning.

Benefits and credits also suffered heavy losses, with 138 leaving in 2012-13 compared with 40 in the previous year.

Nine key senior-level civil servants left their posts this year, the highest number for five years.

‘Stinging criticism’

Roy Maugham, tax partner at UHY Hacker Young, commented that criticism has taken its toll on staff morale.

‘HMRC has come in for some stinging criticism recently over its performance and it seems to be taking some time for staff morale to be restored,’ he said.

‘This latest increase in resignations is not good news for HMRC or the taxpayer, at a time when its effectiveness and quality of service are under intense scrutiny.’

‘It's vital that HMRC focuses on continuously improving its service to ensure individuals and businesses to pay their correct share of tax, but it's hard pressed to achieve this with such high staff turnover going on.’

‘Inevitable’

A spokesperson for HMRC said: ‘Like all large organisations, it is inevitable that some of HMRC’s 64,000 staff will leave or retire, whilst others will join.’

The spokesperson denied that the resignations had affected performance, saying the most accurate measure of the tax gap shows it is going down.

He went on to say that last year’s yield was the taxman’s biggest ever and over 700 prosecutions were carried out.

He said £1bn had been invested in HMRC since 2010 to police the tax rules and more people are employed in compliance posts than before.

 

‘The popularity of our on-line services has enabled us to move staff away from the mass processing work of the past into more specialised and skilled work of tackling evasion and avoidance,’ he added.

According to accountants, HMRC has had to channel more funds into enforcement due to government pressure to tackle tax avoidance and evasion and, as a result, are less equipped to deal with everyday enquiries from customers.

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