Getting hold of HMRC

John_Pierpoint

chrismac1 wrote: »

I have a client whose business is to instal NetApps databases in small to medium sized companies. One of the big pluses is that they have a Mirror server system (don't ask me for details I am not a techie) which means:

1. In the event of one server failing, all the data gets mirrored onto the other one. There will be a loss of speed apparent to users as twice the volume of data is being run on one server, but no loss in functionality or data integrity.

2. When there is a need for a system upgrade, the IT folk transfer all data onto one server and upgrade the other one. Then repeat the process on the second server. So again a loss of speed but no service downtime.

If Dave Hartnett would like a quote for this system for HMRC I am sure my client will oblige. And he won't be asking for £150k for 6 months work like the senior HMRC IT guy asked for and got last year.

The financial markets in London were installing these duplicate systems over 30 years ago - I think the concept originated from the military.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tandem_Computers

On the Radio today there was an interesting little item about Ryan Air.
It seems that under the European directive, if they want to do business over the internet, they must offer Email communications to their customers.
Telling people with a complaint to put it in a letter (or a Fax) to an address in Dublin, is no longer an acceptable way of doing business in the 21st century.
[Rumour has it that the complaints dept. at Ryan Air is one person and that is why they can boast to have the lowest ratio of complaints to customers - everyone tends to accept that complaining is more trouble than the missed flight or what ever.]

Mikeyorks

chrismac1 wrote: »

If Dave Hartnett would like a quote for this system for HMRC I am sure my client will oblige.

I doubt he'd be asking. The first HMRC computers - in the '60s - were De la rue Bull punched card machines. They had the flexibility to run alternate code sets simply by feeding a different pack of cards in - and tweaking the plug boards.

The upgrade in the early '70s was to ICL 2970 and 2972 / 2982 configurations. Even at that early stage the flexibility you mention - as though it was innovative - was achievable via different loadsets. Which held different versions of the operating system and/or middleware and user code.

Subsequent upgrades of hardware have all retained that ability to run different code albeit through differing technology. So it doesn't take an Einstein to identify that this elongated outage is very little to do with the code changes needed for the new tax year being rolled out 6th April. And all to do with database reconfiguration, archiving and the subsequent integrity checking. And the time involved relates to the fact the HMRC databases are massive ..... and this annual exercise can't be conducted piecemeal or by locking out database chunks as you do if Batch updating whilst running online activities alongside.

The PAYE database is the largest with up to 35M base records and up to 6 'accounting' records associated with each. They need to drop off the older accounting records to archive and also redundant base records, where there has been no activity for a stipulated period. Having done that they then need to run integrity checks across the entire database and restore any damaged / missing links. As these processes can't be run concurrently .... we've just consumed the best part of 4 days even on 24hr running. In the background similar processes are running on the smaller SA databases (10M core records + accounting records) and CT databases.

Mary_Hartnell

When we spend money, we often find ourselves paying 20% VAT.
The first tranche of VAT goes to Brussels and is spent on the EU's pet project: Subsidising landowners and farmers, mainly in proportion to the acres they own.

Here in England we have set up The Rural Payments agency to dish out these tax redistributions, which come on top of the automatic subsidy from the VAT zero rating of agriculture. (ie farmers can reclaim all the VAT upstream on their inputs while not charging any VAT on the food they produce)

In 2008 United Kingdom received €3,755 Million in EU farm subsidies or approximately €12,517 per farm.
England would have got over two thirds of that.

http://farmsubsidy.org/GB/

Unfortunately the Rural Payments Agency has an appalling record of poor service to their claimants and has been fined by the EU.

It is looking like 10,000 farms will not get their payment before the end of the tax year.

There is a lovely description of a farmer phoning multiple times to a different clerk each time - trying to get his records corrected.
It makes you wonder if the RPA and HMRC share the same staff and computer systems.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00zf33h#synopsis

I notice that for HMRC the MP's have been assured by Mike Clasper that he is aware of the problems but don't expect radical improvements this side of 2013.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5jGs2GMkPkPQ4Z3XPDDJyUkfCAH6w?docId=N0043401300296030569A

chrismac1

Mike Clasper said: "The area where we have our biggest challenge is that people want to contact us by phone. I'm not happy with the service we have been providing. Our contact centres have been overwhelmed by the number of calls we have had to deal with, dealing with these eight years instead of three years."

Piffle. Nobody wants to call HMRC. We want to e-mail HMRC instead.

Eight years. I for one do not have a single client who has asked me to resolve a problem from 2002-2003, the earliest year I have been dealing with is 2006-2007. I wonder if anyone on this site can put their hand up and say they have been calling the helplines about a problem with 2002-2003?

He assures us things will be fixed by 2013, I'd suggest at current rate of progress 2031 is more reslistic.

Pennywise

chrismac1 wrote: »

"Our contact centres have been overwhelmed by the number of calls we have had to deal with"

But it's HMRC who've forced people into phoning because:-

a. They havn't provided an email facility, and
b. They've closed and downgraded local tax offices so people can't go in and talk in person anymore, and
c. Letters go on a magical mystery tour around the UK and it's a lottery whether they're ever dealt with or disappear into a black hole (or more likely the waste bin), and
d. People have to phone multiple times as the calls are either unanswered or the people they eventually speak to, can't (or won't) do what needs to be done meaning people have to call back. I saw some statistics suggesting up to 60% of calls weren't actually answered by a person! and
e. Because of mistakes made by and delays caused by HMRC, people are more likely to have to phone to chase progress and corrections which otherwise wouldn't have been necessary.

If HMRC are busy dealing with too many phone calls, then they have to look inwards at their own systems to find the solution.

chrismac1

It's not all that relevant to the majority of posters on this site, so apologies for that - but by far the toughest challenge is where you have a client with various aspects interacting - for example VAT and corporation tax, or self-assessment with CIS. As we have seen, the call centres often fail to deliver when just one tax with even quite simple matters is involved. When things are more complex, I tend to both:

1. Write off despite knowing that it will probably be at least 4 months before I get a reply - IF I get one, and
2. Try the various call centres despite knowing that each one will try their best to pass the buck to the other.

In the "good old days" you could just phone your local office or write to them and get a response from an Inspector who was informed on the various different taxes involved. If any of the HMRC posters on this site know of a reliable way of achieving this under the current system I'd be eternally grateful.

villabadger

chrismac1 wrote: »

It's not all that relevant to the majority of posters on this site, so apologies for that - but by far the toughest challenge is where you have a client with various aspects interacting - for example VAT and corporation tax, or self-assessment with CIS. As we have seen, the call centres often fail to deliver when just one tax with even quite simple matters is involved.

In the "good old days" you could just phone your local office or write to them and get a response from an Inspector who was informed on the various different taxes involved. If any of the HMRC posters on this site know of a reliable way of achieving this under the current system I'd be eternally grateful.

I feel your pain with this one as well. We've recently had issues with CIS and Corp Tax - got pushed around the various departments....what I find laughable is that you have speak to different teams within the same department, one to talk about the issue/query and another to discuss payments etc.

After my recent experiences with hmrc, I would agree that it would make sense to have one person who can offer help/advice across the different aspects of business and taxation. It would be nice to feel that you are talking to someone who is competent in this area. I nearly got completely screwed by someone in the CIS department when I tried to find out how to inform them that I have no monthly paye/cis payments to make as our 20% income deduction was in excess of subbie 20% deductions that we make. Their advice was that I should still pay the monthly subbie deductions and that there was no way to notify them of a 'no payment to make' option. They were critically wrong on both points!:mad:

Gas_Powered_Toothbrush

chrismac1 wrote: »

Mike Clasper said

Mike "The coffee served at the meetings does more work than I do" Clasper?

Listening to even a single word he says is probably a bad idea for all concerned.

greytroot

One problem i have, and i owe £2505.20, is i dont have a phone. Now going to use a phone box is a wee bit hard these days (try and find one) to get all my paperwork together then wait and wait and wait - piling in money and getting told yer in a que (like i dont know - having tried 4 times to get through to no avail). I would never think of asking to use a neighbours/friends phone for that amount of time.

Sorry but think i will have to wait for the demanding letters then CAB will have to help me.

Pure turmoil!

JasonLVC

greytroot wrote: »

One problem i have, and i owe £2505.20, is i dont have a phone. Now going to use a phone box is a wee bit hard these days (try and find one) to get all my paperwork together then wait and wait and wait - piling in money and getting told yer in a que (like i dont know - having tried 4 times to get through to no avail). I would never think of asking to use a neighbours/friends phone for that amount of time.

Sorry but think i will have to wait for the demanding letters then CAB will have to help me.

Pure turmoil!

You could always write to them........ignoring HMRC is rarely a good tactic becuase ignoring them could be seen as not helping them, if penalties are due, penalties are mitigated for 'assisting HMRC in their enquiries' so it could cost you more to ignore them in the long run.

Writing is slow, but does mean you are in touch with them, so secures your mitigation but accept letters means a simple query can take weeks to resolve.