HMRC has failed to answer almost 85 million calls from taxpayers over the past decade, new figures show.
HM Revenue and Customs didn’t pick up an average of 22,700 calls from Britons seeking advice on their financial affairs every single day for the past ten years.
New research from the House of Commons Library shows that 1 in 5 calls made by taxpayers have gone unanswered – including six million in the last year alone.
The Liberal Democrats are warning that pensioners are the most likely group to seek advice over the phone and could be excluded if the tax authority ‘keeps failing to get a grip on its phone service’.
The party, which commissioned the research, is calling for HMRC to implement a new ‘hotline’ to quickly process calls from retirees as the state pension approaches an income tax cliff-edge.
Joshua Reynolds, the Lib Dem’s investment spokesman, said it was ‘disgraceful’ that pensioners and small business owners are ‘being hung up on by the very people whose help they need’.
The Liberal Democrats are warning that pensioners are the most likely group to seek advice over the phone and could be excluded if the tax authority ‘keeps failing to get a grip on its phone service’ (stock Image)
The extraordinary prospect of pensioners having to pay income tax for the first time arises because the personal allowance – the level at which income becomes taxable – is stuck at £12,570 at least until 2028. Pictured: Chancellor Rachel Reeves
He said: ‘It’s simply disgraceful to think that those people haven’t been able to access the decent service they deserve from HMRC – all because the previous Conservative Government drove the agency into the ground and the current Government has so far failed to turn things around.
‘Pensioners are already struggling with the price of food, heating their homes and worrying that their state pension is just pennies away from the income tax threshold – they don’t need “try the taxman again” on their to-do lists.’
From next April the new state pension will be £12,548 – meaning retirees are edging closer to having to pay income tax for the first time after the tax-free personal allowance was frozen at £12,570 until 2028.
The Lib Dems are warning that ‘retirees, who are among the likeliest to seek tax information over the phone, risk being particularly badly hit when more and more are dragged into income tax’.
Mr Reynolds added: ‘The Government should work with HMRC to launch a new “Retiree Red Phone” hotline to make sure they can finally get through to the proper support they need.’
The data also show that rates of successful pickup were as low as 72.5 per cent in 2022/23, with the latest figures for 2024/25 showing that 1 in 5 callers did not get through to the tax service.
Meanwhile the average waiting time for calls to HMRC in 2024/25 was 18 minutes and 38 seconds, the second highest in the last decade after the 23 minutes and 14 seconds recorded in 2023/24.
HMRC said that average call wait times in the first quarter of 2025-26 was 13 minutes and 38 seconds compared to wait times of 27 minutes and 2 seconds in the first quarter of 2024-25.
An HMRC spokesman said: ‘We successfully handle tens of millions of customer queries every year and our customer service has vastly improved since the start of 2024/25.
‘We’re answering the overwhelming majority of calls and will always be there to support taxpayers who need more help.’
