Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 19
19
Nonetheless, the pandemic continues to affect business sectors differently.47 For example, with the Bounce Back...
Conclusion
Nonetheless, the pandemic continues to affect business sectors differently.47 For example, with the Bounce Back Loan scheme there was considerable variation between industry sectors, both in their borrowing of Bounce Back Loans and in how their borrowing patterns had changed relative to other sectors since the pandemic.48 But HMRC’s segmentation of its customers does not include data on whether they accessed a Bounce Back Loan.49 As government support schemes close, data about which customers accessed these schemes will be less relevant to their current situation, while sector data may still be relevant.50 46 Qq 55–57 47 Qq 42, 54–58; C&AG’s Report, para 2.8, 2.13, 2.14 48 C&AG’s Report, The Bounce Back Loan Scheme: an update, Session 2021–22, HC 861, 3 December 2021, para 1.5, Figure 5 49 Q 84; C&AG’s Report, para 2.13 50 Qq 42, 54–58; C&AG’s Report, para 2.8, 2.13, 2.14 16 HMRC’s management of tax debt 3 Supporting vulnerable customers and managing rogue businesses Vulnerable customers
Government Response
Not Addressed
HM Government
Not Addressed
5: PAC conclusion: HMRC is not using all relevant data sources to understand how the pandemic is affecting taxpayer’s ability to repay. 5: PAC recommendation: HMRC should identify and obtain the data sources which are most relevant to understand the ongoing impact of the pandemic on businesses. As a minimum we would expect HMRC to make use of sectoral data. 5.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: December 2022 5.2 HMRC recognises the importance of using relevant data about businesses to understand their ability to pay their debts and that this is important beyond the impact of the pandemic. HMRC already has access to a lot of data about businesses through their various tax returns. HMRC used changes in turnover, visible from VAT returns, and changes in the number of employees and overall pay bill, visible from PAYE returns, when assessing how businesses had been impacted by the pandemic. 5.3 HMRC will combine its response with recommendation 4 and set out what data it is using, or planning to use, to assess ability to pay and why. Acquiring, analysing and using data has financial and opportunity costs, so it is important to consider the value for money of each data source. 5.4 HMRC will re-assess the extent to which sectoral data adds value to its segmentation approach. However, previous analysis has shown that it is less effective than business- specific data as impacts within sectors can vary widely.