Having previously released procurement documents alerting the market to potential commercial opportunity ahead, the tax department has now revealed the formal appointment of a senior responsible owner for the scheme
HM Revenue and Customs has revealed details of a new major project set to be worth more than £1bn and intended to “create a generational shift in customer service” by creating a single unified view of each citizen’s interaction with the tax system.
The department has revealed that its Enterprise Customer Relationship Management (ECRM) programme is a recent addition to the government’s major projects portfolio. Details of the scheme were contained in a newly issued transparency document formally announcing the appointment of HMRC senior official Mike Beddington as the project’s senior responsible owner.
The appointment letter reveals that the ECRM programme will run until March 2030 and aims to “deliver a more personalised, efficient, and secure service by providing a single, unified view of each customer’s interactions, across all HMRCs tax regimes”.
“This will improve the customer experience by allowing the customer to have a single full view of their tax obligations, reducing the need for customers to repeat information, improve service consistency, and increase satisfaction across all channels,” the document adds.
Internally, there will be benefit for “HMRC colleagues [in] having a single view of a customer’s tax obligations/benefit, reducing the number of systems required to manage customer queries, interactions and affairs, creating a better experience… and reducing handling time through the ability to centrally manage and view customer information”.
The programme will also include the implementation of “advanced analytics” that will offer “a 360-degree view of the customer and interactions with HMRC [and] will provide the breadth and depth of data needed to inform downstream compliance activity, [and] support upstream compliance activity”.
HMRC will increase its efforts in “using that data and business logic to become more proactive/pre-emptive, and support more targeted communications through prompts and nudges, proactive compliance interventions, and improved policy and resource planning”.
The letter adds: “The programme aims to create a generational shift in customer service, improve compliance, reduce operational costs, and support HMRC’s 2030 vision and Spending Review commitments.”
Objectives
Beddington will oversee the delivery of 10 specified objectives, beginning with the “timely completion of procurement and contract award for a single software-as-a-service CRM platform”.
Last summer, HMRC issued a commercial notice outlining its intent to award a £1.2bn contract – lasting up to 15 years – to a provider of an enterprise CRM platform. That deal was slated to come into effect in February 2026, but details of the chosen tech partner have yet to be finalised.
The notice indicated that the new CRM system “will be required to seamlessly integrate with updated customer service platforms, including [HMRC]’s future Contact Centre as a Service” arrangement – which is also currently awaiting completion of the procurement process for a £600m deal.
Beddington has also been appointed to lead work on implementing the new contact centre – and, between this and the ECRM programme, these project-leader roles will now account for 100% of his time, his appointment letter indicates.
His second objective for ECRM will be ensuring a “clear and evidenced approvals path, with an updated programme business case” aligned with Treasury requirements.
The third task on his agenda will be “phased delivery, with dual-running transition states”.
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This will be followed by the creation of an “effective data strategy and unified customer view”, then “comprehensive adoption and change management” and the implementation of a “supplier performance-management framework”.
Moving into the later stages of the five-year programme of work, the SRO will oversee the creation of a “benefits realisation and evaluation framework” and will also be expected to ensure “financial stewardship within approved” capital and operational budgets, his appointment letter states.
The final two objectives on the list are the implementation of “assurance and compliance guardrails” and, lastly, an “intelligent client function [that is] fully operational, [and will] strengthen HMRC’s strategic oversight and decision-making by embedding a capable enduring client function that drives accountability and delivery success”.
The ultimate aim of the ECRM project is to support HMRC in delivering three overarching ambitions.
The first of these is “improving day-to-day performance for individuals and businesses” – which ties in with the tax department’s stated target of ensuring 90% of all customer interactions are conducted digitally within the next four years, the SRO document indicates.
HMRC also hopes that the £1bn-plus initiative will help in “closing the tax gap” and “driving reform and modernisation of UK’s tax and customs systems” – an objective that will be assisted by the delivery of “new IT which enables different parts of HMRC’s system to be joined up”.
As ECRM has joined the major projects portfolio since the publication of the last government-wide annual progress report, there is not yet any publicly available data on the programme’s whole-life cost, nor its estimated returns.
PublicTechnology understands that the project will be delivered in increments, with initial work focused on bringing on board the highest-priority services. Alongside the implementation of major new technology platforms, the ECRM agenda will also include revamping department processes and methods, it is understood.
In response to our enquiries, an HMRC spokesperson said: “Enterprise Customer Relationship Management (ECRM) is a key part of our modernisation programme. It will bring together customer information across our services, making it easier for them to interact with us and help our staff resolve issues more quickly. That means a more resilient, efficient service and better outcomes for customers. The procurement process follows rigorous government guidelines to ensure transparency, fairness and value for money.”
