JP Marks, HMRC Chief Executive and First Permanent Secretary, said:
It’s my privilege to be leading HMRC as we embark on this period of transformative change: becoming a digital-first organisation, focused on closing the tax gap and improving the experience of our customers.
The roadmap sets out the transformation journey we will undertake: increasing the automation of tax and customs administration and better integrating it into customers’ everyday lives, as well as improving the services used by those that advise and support them.
This will be a world in which everyday tax and customs tasks, processes and compliance can happen with minimal effort thanks to simplified processes, the application of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, and more digital self-serve options for customers that give them greater control and offer quicker solutions to their queries.
As a result, HMRC staff will be able to spend more time helping taxpayers who are in vulnerable circumstances, digitally excluded, or have complex tax affairs. It will also free up our time to support businesses who are seeking greater certainty over their plans for investment and growth.
What the roadmap says
HMRC’s Transformation Roadmap details the actions that the department will take to achieve against our priorities, and some of the changes that taxpayers and businesses can expect to see.
We will improve the experience of customers, building on the progress we have made over the past year. During 2024 to 2025 we have reduced the time people are spending on the phone waiting to speak to our advisers, but many people are still waiting too long.
We’re sending out too many paper letters, and some of our digital services are not yet where we want them to be.
As part of our plans to improve customers’ experience, to reduce the time people spend verifying themselves when calling us, we’re introducing voice biometrics. We’re moving to a digital by default approach for most outbound customer communication, unless customers agree otherwise, and expanding our digital service offer to ensure at least 90% of customer interaction can take place digitally by 2029 to 2030.
Our digital first approach will see HMRC automating tax where possible, offering new digital self-serve options across a number of tax regimes. This includes new PAYE features that will allow customers to make changes to income, verify tax payments, and to check allowances and deductions. There are also plans to launch a new service to make it easier to claim tax relief on expenses.
The changes we’re making are aimed at improving the day-to-day experience of all of our customers, including those who choose to use a tax agent or intermediary.
We’re also working with professional bodies to identify where we can improve the services they use: introducing new capabilities to enable agents to digitally withdraw their clients from Self Assessment, enhancing our Income Record Viewer to include more information on clients’ income, and launching a new service to allow agents to submit information which may impact their clients’ tax code digitally.
We will close the tax gap, recruiting and training an additional 5,500 compliance and 2,400 debt colleagues to bring in £7.5bn more per year to fund public services by 2029 to 2030. Greater use of automation, AI and third-party data will help us to better identify compliance risks and the actions needed to prevent them, and we’ll invest in better digital services, simplify tax rules, and improve our education and guidance to support customers and the intermediaries who act for them to get their tax right.
We’re already taking steps to achieve these aspirations, and today we are publishing draft legislation for the Finance Bill 2025-26 to help us bring these plans to fruition, alongside other measures.
These include stronger powers for HMRC to investigate suspected promoters of tax avoidance schemes, new measures to tackle tax non-compliance in the umbrella company market, and a legal requirement for tax advisers to register with HMRC. Search ‘Finance Bill 2025-26’ on GOV.UK for more information.
Small businesses made up 60% of the tax gap in 2023 to 2024, with a range of behaviours contributing to the total – from simple errors to deliberate non-compliance. We will make it as easy as possible for businesses of any size to fulfil their obligations so they can spend more time growing their business; expanding the rollout of digitalised record keeping through Making Tax Digital and making better use of data by pre-populating more information on tax returns and providing prompts in digital services, reducing the potential for errors. This includes making better use of new and improved data from third parties, including banks, from April 2026.
We will tackle offshore tax evasion by the wealthy and prevent large businesses using contrived arrangements to minimise their tax bills. Around 400 more experts will be tasked with identifying and reducing wealthy offshore non-compliance using cutting-edge risking, data analytics, and new data sources.
The importance of continued collaboration
We’re building from good foundations, but we have more to do to engage, to listen, and to build trust with customers and stakeholders, guided by our Charter standards. Our teams have been speaking to many of you in the run up to publication of the roadmap, and we will continue that engagement in the months and years to come as we focus on delivery.
We know that success will depend in no small part on close collaboration and partnership with you, our stakeholders. Please
take the time to read the roadmap and consider the part you will play on this journey.
We are also committed to publishing regular updates on progress – as new and enhanced digital services go live, and new opportunities present themselves for us to co-create solutions together with you.
