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HMRC advises on the impact of COVID-19 on service levels.

08 - 09 - 2020

Additional benefits of working with your accountant. In light of the published data from HMRC, letting your accountant work with HMRC on your behalf can save you time and sanity.

Data released from HMRC has demonstrated the impact of COVID on their service levels during April to June this year. Perhaps justified by reducing operating hours and re-deploying staff to man new helplines required for the many new government initiatives, the published data shows call waiting times increased to approximately 12 minutes, double the target time of 5 minutes waiting.  Figures released show that 8.7M call attempts were made in the period measured., however this was also noted as a reduction, as in the same period previously there were in excess of 12M calls.

The handling of post items was also impacted as data reports that 84% of post being cleared within 15 days by HMRC.

 HMRC advises of steps being taken to improve performance during the pandemic, including, encouraging the use of webchat, as this service can be handled from newly trained staff from home, and increasing the operating hours in the coming weeks/months in line with Covid-19 guidelines.