HMRC has technical problems with its phone lines which has seen telephone helplines closed for the last 24 hours
The chair of the Treasury Committee has asked for urgent answers on the current HMRC customer service outage.
Following an announcement that HMRC has shut phone lines and online services, the chair asked for details on the nature of the issue and the number of customers expected to be affected. The issue started on Thursday 1 December.
In a letter to the head of HMRC Jim Harra, Treasury Committee chair Harriet Baldwin MP also requested an outline of the procedures implemented to prevent a complete loss of service and how HMRC will deal with pressing issues from taxpayers.
Commenting on the correspondence, Baldwin said: ‘It is seriously concerning to see taxpayers are currently unable to reach the taxman by telephone.
‘These unexpected outages should be a thing of the past. That’s why I’ve today written to the head of HMRC to demand urgent answers on the issues facing customers over the past 24 hours.’
HMRC made a brief announcement on Twitter on Thursday 1 December at 6pm saying that its phone services would be temporarily closed.
'Due to technical issues we have taken the decision to shut a number of our phone lines and online services. We are sorry for any inconvenience and are working urgently to resolve this issue.'