HC Deb 25 March 2002 vol 382 cc736-8W
Mr. Swayne

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what targets are in place at Inland Revenue contact centres in respect of the time taken to answer to customer telephone inquiries; and if he will make a statement. [44702]

Dawn Primarolo

Inland Revenue contact centres work to the following targets for call handling:

  • No more than 5 per cent. of attempted calls to reach an engaged tone.
  • No more than 5 per cent. of attempted calls to be abandoned.
  • Of the calls not engaged or abandoned, 90 per cent. to be answered within 20 seconds.
An attempted call is counted each time a customer dials the contact centre number.

Mr. Swayne

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the policy of the Inland Revenue is with respect to providing customers with direct line numbers for inquiries to customer call centres; and if he will make a statement. [44699]

Dawn Primarolo

Ten million PAYE taxpayers have new Inland Revenue contact centres as their first point of telephone contact. By July 2002 this number will have grown to 15 million (50 per cent. of PAYE taxpayers).

For these taxpayers, where there is ongoing correspondence with an individual tax officer or inspector, a direct dial number will be provided so that the customer can make contact with the individual concerned. Unsolicited calls are handled by the contact centre, which provides a local rate number to customers.

Mr. Swayne

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what mechanisms exist to establish whether sufficient telephone lines are in place at Inland Revenue customer call centres to handle the volume of customer telephone inquiries. [44700]

Dawn Primarolo

Staffing levels of the first five of Inland Revenue taxpayer contact centres were based on analysis of an experimental IR contact centre opened in 1998 in East Kilbride. Statistical analysis of call volumes there was used to inform the rollout programme.

The number of advisers is intended to allow the centres to meet targets on all but 15 days each year using a mixture of full and part time staff. Resource teams in each office match staff resources to the predicted call volumes.

On the 15 days where excess volumes are anticipated, calls are overflowed to customer service units in local offices.

Mr. Swayne

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what targets exist at Inland Revenue contact centres for the time taken returning customer calls; and if he will make a statement. [44701]

Dawn Primarolo

Where a customer has raised a query that cannot be handled by the Inland Revenue contact centre they have contacted, the call will be passed to an officer in the service office to resolve the inquiry. Where that is not possible, or where further research is required, the target is to return to the customer within one working day. This will be extended if

  • another time would be more convenient to the customer, or
  • research will take longer than one working day.
In these situations a different time scale would be agreed with the customer.