10 Sep 2025
MPs were recently told that four million calls to HMRC go unanswered each year, risking 'undermining compliance and the government's revenue targets'.
In a Commons Business Committee hearing, MPs questioned HMRC on its mechanisms for collecting £46.8 billion in tax owed but not yet recovered.
During the hearing, Jonathan Athow, Director General of Customer Strategy and Tax Design at HMRC, revealed that only 85% of calls are answered.
Mr Athow commented: 'Our target is about 85%. That's what we're funded now to do. We are pretty close to those levels at the moment. I think we're about 83%.
'At the top of my head, we're talking maybe three or four million calls potentially. I'm just trying to think through how the numbers flow through our system, because they are triaged and people are allowed to work out what they want to do, whether they want to wait for somebody or not. It's probably three to four million calls that go unanswered.'