Hmrc Reviews 279

I gave 1 star as there was no option for zero!!!!
Appalling system and staff!
I applied for my tax rebate in JUNE... they couldn't put it into my bank as its a building society. While I'm waiting for a cheque some slimy little Weasle had tried sticking in an online bank under my name.
I phoned after 5 weeks to yell them I didn't receive my cheque, that's when they saw suspicious activity.
I was told to phone back in 4 weeks.
I've been phoning every few weeks since August. To be told they have no idea what's happening, but to phone back as it Is being 'dealt with'
I phoned again yesterday and the man I spoke too told me he would send a referral to see if he could issue my cheque.
But I've a feeling it was another 'fob off'
They have no clue about your case, you'll get 'yes I understand' but no help finding out anything like why it's taken 8 months to 'investigate'
The 10 minutes trying to get through while you talk to a robot is frustrating enough!!!!!!

Awful service!!!!!!!
Sort it out!!!!!!

Useless, absolutely hate dealing with them.

Absolutely terrible service. Not helpful one bit. I was on the phone for 45 minures. and they have left me 3 days on hold, by not knowing the addional information. This caused me major distress. Don't even recommend HMRC its a total joke!!! I've a phone bill of £70 by waiting on the line to be answered.

Complete waste of time and money. It's about time we started to see value for the money that they steal from everybody.

terrible customer service. My child received their NIN and it was in the completely wrong name that was change over 10 years ago then we called and I was on hold for over 40 minutes when I finally thought I had got it sorted it they had sent it and it was yet again a whole new name which was still wrong. Called again today still over 45 mins wait absolutely ridiculous.

After my 5th phone call to try and sort a tax rebate out from march last year a dinosaur lectured me on how it was my fault I had not got my rebate, despite following the advice given from previous phone calls, I am owed several thousands and can’t seem to get my hands on it. He would not let me talk, he then said he would help me with part of the rebate, then the awful music was back, 20 minutes later I was cut off.
How do you deal with these in empathetic robots?

I was qualified as the 'named person' with my partner's company. The tax return for 2023=2024 was returned before the deadline. Two weeks AFTER receiving it, HMRC returned it to my partner, stating that they could not accept the return as it had been signed by a 'third party' (me). The tax return was returned by special delivery next day for which Royal Mail charged us £8.50 to include a compensation for delivery by 1pm. The second tax return was signed on reception by HMRC and it was still within the deadline, yet they sent us a message that the return by post was overdue (it was not, as we got an extension until 15th February 2025 but it had now to be done online since the deadline is later online than by post. The extension to 15/02/25 was granted because the first return was signed by the named person, hence it was on time and there was no need to file online.
Yet, to avoid arguing at a sensitive time which of course would result in a fine for late delivery if we started disputing the 'attitude' of HMRC (caused by their negligence and disinterest in doing their job properly). This is the second year that the company suffers at the hand of this unscrupulous government organisation, bringing us back to King John which of course we know how the unfairness was stopped with the people's intervention......
The first year this happened was that Royal Mail had lost the return for 2022-2023. I filed a complaint with RM who apologised, as it was sent by recorded post. A meagre compensation was granted (£3.43 for the recorded postage), but HMRC did not accept the 'excuse' that Royal Mail was at fault, despite providing the recorded receipt, the letter from RM's CEO to whom I wrote, the acceptance by RM that the mail had been lost. In the list of HMRC drawn by gov.uk, there are mitigating circumstances (or valid excuses) which are accepted, yet despite the justifications and evidence, our company was fined £220. On 4th February 2024 (4 months later) the return was found by HMRC but they DID NOT TELL US, I found out with the tracking number and a signature which dated back to BEFORE THE DEADLINE FOR THE RETURN, i.e.31/10/2023.
We have now a new complaint with HMRC, as when the company owner himself tried to file online to avoid yet another fine (deadline 15/2/2025), he had to enter his identity details, which he did and a code which had to be applied for. He applied for the code but the code was refused on the grounds that they did not recognise his details. This is not the 3rd party remember the first excuse from HMRC that they did not accept the initial return because I, the named 3rd party, had signed it. Not at all this time, the director entered his details as HMRC required, in vain. Has anyone been through this crazy and frustrating Merry Go 'Round?
HMRC in this case and can be seen on this site, is unconstitutional.
90% OF NEGATIVE REVIEWS SHOW THAT HMRC IS NOT SERVING THE PEOPLE. THEIR BEHAVIOUR IS UNACCEPTABLE AND SHOULD BE INVESTIGATED BY THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT. I suggest that all who have a complaint write to their MP. Surely they will have to intervene and redress the bad numbers at HMRC.

After waiting for an hour the customer support agent hang up on me. My tax code always goes down for no reason, so I pay more tax. I'd like to know penny by penny where have you been spending tax?

Waited 45 minutes on the phone to speak to someone who had no clue what they were doing, kept pausing and didn’t explain what was going on. Only minutes into the call they put the phone down. Noone called me back. Absolutely disgusting.

The HMRC recently wrote to me stating that just over £100 of income tax was owed and it would be taken in instalments. However, it was then taken as a lump sum from my salary, but this was OK. This amount was then deducted from my next 2 months salaries. Therefore, they have either taken too much tax or their letter was incorrect - Both scenarios cannot be correct. As their website fails to provide an email address, and the 'Webchat' doesn't recognise words like 'tax', I phoned the helpline, and spoke to a helpful man who appeared to understand what had occurred, insomuch as tax had been erroneously deducted twice. Unfortunately, he put the call on hold and the line then went dead for no apparent reason.
I then wrote a letter explaining this. First I received a letter from Caroline which consisted of one condensed paragraph, with no line breaks, scant punctuation and 'text' abbreviations instead of real words. The actual content simply stated facts which I already knew and offered no solution or new information.
I then received another letter from an unnamed person, which was even worse. The opening sentence did not make any sense grammatically - Do they not check this? The remainder of this letter basically just asked for information which I had already provided. Why ask for something they already know?
I will not be wasting any more time on this matter and will wait until the end of the tax year to receive my refund.

The best customer service ever was today with Cos.. The kindest and very polite .. He helped me so much to solve my situation.. If everyone would be like Cos all the customers would be happy ..

HMRC are a joke, everything is hard work. I have spent 10's of hours trying to sort out why my VAT return was changed by HMRC, apparently it cant be changed yet it has been changed. Fraudulent activity from HMRC just about sums up the government as a whole. looking forward to moving out of this country.

Paid CGT Bill a month ago after they make it as difficult as possible to pay and
Still waiting for confirmation
No reciept for a substantial amount of money
Employees probably on a beach somewhere WFH
WTF is going on

Very efficient at taking tax from you, but completely incompetent when it comes to giving it back. HMRC owe me quite a large rebate, which they agree they owe me, but I have been trying for 4 months to get it back after their first cheque was sent to an incomplete address and then cancelled. 4 agents have given me completely different stories, and I waited in all day today (2 days before Christmas) for an arranged call from a Manager, which of course never came. Beyond incompetent. If they were a private business they would have been forced to shut down.

I thought I would use the time I am being kept on hold on the HMRC phone 'helpline' to write a review about this dreadful service. Mine was a simple query which I tried to find the answer to online. I have been charged far too much tax and been left out of pocket after making a withdrawal from my pension. I will get the money back in April but have been left in the lurch due to being charged 45% tax instead of 20%. I wanted to find out how to reclaim overpaid tax on a pension lumps sum without having a PAYE code. A simple phone number was all I needed in the absence of an answer on all the many pages I have been directed around to no avail. I have had a lot of tax taken which I did not expect and it seems there is no way of reclaiming part of it before April. The chat function was useless (as expected) and wouldn't pass me on to a human. I went round the block many times trying to just find a simple phone number and I always get directed back to a part of the site I have tried before. Meanwhile the muzak is just painful and designed to make you give up. They could at least make it relaxing music and tell you where you are in the queue but no. I really feel for people without internet who HAVE to phone. It is just awful. What really annoys me is that we have to pay for this appalling service. They are always ready to grab your money but not give it back when owed. I finally got through after 34 mins of torture to be told that there is no way of getting some money refunded now and they won't be paying interest on the £1000s they have 'borrowed' from me. Happy Christmas all - except the scrooges at HMRC!

Nobody ever gets back to me about my queries. It’s impossible to get any answer from them, I have been waiting for more than 6 months now on a straightforward question. They have an App, but it doesn’t look like their staff is using it to communicate with the customers.

Stole a massive chunk of my wage due to tax code error to which they admitted was there mistake and shouldn't of happened. been told they can't refund me the money taken which is 100s of pounds until next month. explained the financial difficulty this has put me into given the fact its christmas in just a few weeks and I've now been left with no spare cash to buy gifts or buy in christmas food shopping. the advisor couldn't care less and put the phone down on me saying he had other calls go deal with. disgusting that they can mistakingly steal your earnings then completely refuse to pay back ASAP. thanks hmrc for wrecking my christmas.

What to say that's not already been said.

Impossible to get through, constantly told that your question can be answered online. If it could, why would I call? Menus are beyond stupid, spending 1 hour on hold to be told I've come through to the wrong department and would need to call back.

Today, after 30 minutes on hold, I was told my call couldn't be continued and to call back later.

The irony being, if you have days to spend waiting and can actually speak to someone then they are usuall really knowledgable and helpful.

It's almost like they want people to mess their tax up and get fined?

I had to speak to someone about my self assessment, and as usual I go through the agony of doing this. Nothing changes one year to the next, long phone waits and the automated robot is still saying to watch YouTube videos to solve the problem or go to our website. Would I be ringing if I could solve this online? Appalling service which everyone seems to experience

I can't lie, I am usually the type of person to absolutely dread having to speak to HMRC due to the seemingly 'notorious' long and unsuccessful attempts to complete a query on the phone.

Luckily, I was able to get through very quickly today and speak to Phill A who was an absolute STAR. Not only was he patient in listening to my query and offering a solution, he also explained how I can keep ontop of this throughout the tax year and make the most of my HMRC App.

Really appreciate the time he took on the phone and completely changed my outlook on having to contact HMRC. We all need a Phill A!