HM Revenue & Customs'(HMRC) IT
systems are hampering its efforts to collect billions of unpaid tax
revenues every year. But the department says it cannot afford the
£250m it would cost to link the systems and improve
efficiency.
MPs on the
Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said separate IT systems that
cannot be linked are "major barriers to effective and efficient
debt management".
It means that taxpayers with debts in different areas of tax
cannot be joined, so it is not possible to highlight those who owe
debts on different taxes.
In 2007/08, HMRC collected £450bn tax and National Insurance
contributions from 35 million UK taxpayers. But on 31 March last
year £17.3bn had not been paid.
HMRC said it would cost £250m to build systems that would link
all of a taxpayer's records, which are currently held on different
systems for different taxes.
The PAC
report
said, "The systems are old and not compatible with each other so
the department cannot readily establish how many taxpayers have a
debt on more than one tax."
Despite being unable to build a new system, the report says HMRC
is looking at ways of linking up tax debts in its existing systems,
for example by bringing VAT debts into its main debt management
system.
The committee said HMRC should also do more to exploit
developments in payment technology. It said there are not enough
options for taxpayers and suggested that autopayment technology,
Paypoint and Payzone should be looked at.