After 39 consecutive months of missing the mark of answering 85% of calls, the tax agency’s investments in the latter half of 2024 are paying dividends, newly published data suggests
In 2024’s closing months HM Revenue and Customs hit its baseline target for telephone customer service for the first time in three years, recently published data indicates.
The department’s stated ambition is to answer 85% of all calls to its helplines. An average of about three million such calls are made each month – although volumes vary across the year, in line with tax-filing deadlines.
But, for a period of more than three whole years, for 39 consecutive months from June 2021 to October 2024, the 85% target was not met – and for all but the first six of these months the figure did not even pass 80%.
The annual averages for the 2022, 23, and 24 fiscal years declined from 77.3%, to 71.1% and, finally, 66.4%.
In its most recent annual report, the tax agency said that “our overall service levels on telephony and correspondence remained below our service standards… and we recognise that this caused real difficulties for some customers and agents”.
In April 2024 – the first month of the current year – telephone performance fell to its lowest level, with just 53.5% of calls answered.
The month after this nadir – and after backtracking on unpopular plans to close some helplines for large parts of the year – HMRC announced that it would, instead, be provided with £51m in additional funding to help bring its telephone support back up to standards.
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Transparency data shows that performance steadily improved from July onwards, culminating in 85.4% of calls being answered in October – marking the first time the formal target has been exceeded in over three years.
While levels dipped marginally in November, performance remained more-or-less on track at 84.7%.
The cumulative proportion of calls successfully answered during the first eight months of FY25 stands at 69% – a rise of 15.5 percentage points since the start of year.
HMRC’s latest monthly data release shows that, during November, the department’s net easy score for its phone, webchat and online services was 65.2. This figure – which is calculated by subtracting the proportion of negative customer feedback from the proportion of positive feedback – has climbed more than six points since April, although still lags the target score of 70.
A total of 81.8% of users in November said they were satisfied or very satisfied with HMRC’s customer service – exceeding the department’s 80% target.
Some 94% of webchats during the month were successfully dealt with, while 79.1% of letters and online forms were responded to within 15 days, and 90.9% within 40 days.
In recent years the department has been striving to encourage citizens and businesses to use online tools, where possible. During the 2023-24 year 388 million customer interactions with HMRC were conducted digitally – equating to 69% of the overall total.
While this proportion marked a significant jump on the prior-year figure of 63%, the department still believes “that around 66% of total telephony contact is still for tasks that can be carried out online”, according to the FY24 annual report.
“To deliver the service standards our customers expect, our aim is to reduce the volume of contact through phone and correspondence over time and boost the number of customers self-serving online, without needing to contact us,” the document added.
