Inland Revenue to shed taxing image

Press, 11 May 1989, Page 2

Inland Revenue to shed taxing image

By

PATTRICK SMELLIE

in Wellington

That bastion of the intimidating form letter, the Inland Revenue Department, will try to shrug off the impersonal image and prove it is prepared to listen. The Commissioner of Inland Revenue, Mr David Henry, yesterday announced the introduction of a new problem resolution service for taxpayers with sticky tax department problems. The service will be for individual and business taxpayers alike, with experienced tax officials in every tax office, ready to handle problems which fit the department’s criteria. Those are simply that the problem should be one which has been pursued through the department in the normal way, and has failed to get a result after a reasonable time. Mr Henry said the target was to resolve problems within five days of notifying the problem resolution officer. “That could sometimes be difficult to

meet, but that’s the target,” he said. The new proposal responded to taxpayers’ demand, partly because of the increasing complexity of the tax system. Staff had increased 54 per cent since 1984 to deal with new tax measures, the largest increase being for the introduction of GST. Permanent tax staff now numbered >453, handling more than 3.9 million tax returns, more than 1.6 million phone and counter inquiries, 1.6 million letters, and issuing 12.7 million items of mail a year, for 2.4 million taxpayers.

While most people’s dealings with the department went smoothly, there were likely to be slip-ups with such large numbers of transactions involved, said Mr Henry. A pamphlet outlining the new service suggested it will be useful for long delays over income tax and GST refunds, answering letters, issuing assessments, and finalising tax and payroll audits.

Decisions which seemed unfair or were incomplete could also be dealt with through the new service.