Earlier this month HMRC's annual report and accounts for the year ended 31 March 2023 were published together with the HMRC Charter annual report 2022/23. The National Audit Office also published its report on HMRC’s accounts. The Comptroller and Auditor General qualified his opinion of HMRC annual report and accounts for 2022/23 on the basis of error and fraud in both research and development tax reliefs and tax credits.
In 2022/23 HMRC collected £814 billion in tax revenues, £82.9 billion more than 2021/22 and an increase of 11.3 percent. More information on the highlights from 2022/23 is available in the publication HMRC's annual report and accounts 2022 to 2023: performance overview.
Information in the 2022/23 annual report and accounts, the Charter 2022/23 annual report, and performance update publications continues to reflect HMRC ongoing poor service levels but also sets out, in the Chief Executive’s Review of 2022/23, HMRC’s ambition to “reduce the volume of contact through phone and post by 30% by 2025”.
Chartered Accountants Ireland continues to discuss HMRC’s poor performance at various forum meetings and remains concerned that HMRC is seeking to introduce new online services to reduce the need for traditional contact channels too quickly. We are also concerned that insufficient agent services are being prioritised for development. These concerns are reflected in the Institute’s annual position paper, the Next Financial Year 2023, which is due to be published in September.
The HMRC Charter annual report 2022/23 also reviewed HMRC’s performance against the principles set out in the HMRC Charter. The report clearly acknowledges that 2022/23 was a challenging year for HMRC across many traditional phone and post services. Although there were some specific factors contributing to this, overall HMRC’s “customer” base is growing, with many taxpayers having more complex needs. This will continue in 2023/24 hence HMRC aims to shift demand from the traditional phone and post channels to online services in order to meet the demands on their services in the context of their reduced budget and resources.
Last week HMRC also published Individuals, Small Businesses and Agents, Mid-sized Business and Large Business survey results.
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