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HMRC's Phone Line Is Its Worst-Rated Service Channel

ended 11. July 2026

A tax office that is going digital-first is quietly steering its hardest cases towards the one channel it serves worst. HMRC's latest performance data for 2025-26, published on 9 July, shows that across the full year its telephone service scored just 57.2% for customer satisfaction, the lowest of its three main channels, against 72.8% for webchat and 82.1% for digital services. Nearly half of callers, 48.2%, waited more than ten minutes to be answered over the year, and the average wait was 12 minutes 35 seconds.

HMRC's own framing is that service is improving, and on a strong March finish it is: the wait fell to 7 minutes 3 seconds and 91.3% of adviser call attempts were handled that month. But the full-year picture is the one that lasts, and it shows the phone, the channel of last resort for the complex, the urgent and the non-standard, and for agents untangling a client's affairs, rated below every online alternative. Digital-first clears the simple queries into self-serve, where 78% of interactions now happen, and concentrates what is left onto the line. So as HMRC pushes ever more people into digital filing under Making Tax Digital, the cost of a poor phone service lands where it is hardest to see, on the taxpayer's own time. The sole trader chasing a coded-out error, the landlord querying a bill, the accountant on hold to fix a wrong tax code, they are the ones left waiting.

  1. A phone service rated worst of all HMRC's channels: is that an acceptable trade-off for a digital-first tax office, or a sign the strategy is leaving its hardest cases behind?
  2. Who is hit hardest when the phone is the weakest channel, the people whose problems do not fit a webform, and is it fair that going digital-first shifts the cost onto their own time?
  3. What should HMRC do so that clearing the simple queries online does not degrade the one channel complex cases depend on? Do you have a client whose problem could only be fixed on the phone and who paid for it in time on hold? If so, please give as much colour and detail as possible.

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Editor
Harvey Dhillon
Founder & CEO at Zmartly
Picture an accountant on hold to HMRC to untangle a client's wrong tax code, a problem no webform will fix. HMRC's own performance data for 2025-26, published on 9 July, rates its phone service at 57.2% for customer satisfaction over the year, the lowest of its three channels, below webchat on 72.8% and digital on 82.1%. Nearly half of callers, 48.2%, waited more than ten minutes. A digital-first tax office is quietly routing its hardest cases to its worst-rated channel: self-serve now handles 78% of interactions and clears the simple questions, leaving the phone to carry the complex and the urgent. The people who feel it are the sole trader with a coded-out error and the landlord querying a bill, not the well-advised who rarely call. If your problem genuinely needs the phone, call early and have every figure to hand, because the queue is the price of a case that does not fit a form. As Making Tax Digital pushes more online, the calls that remain will only get harder.