IDG30447 | Confidentiality when dealing with the customer: Deemed Consent for those who need extra support

Deemed Consent is one of the objectives set out in the Customer Centric Business Strategy and in the HMRC Unpaid Agent Strategy. It is about making it easier for those who need extra support to seek help through intermediaries, such as unpaid agents (e.g. friends, family, voluntary sector) without having to send HMRC their written evidence of the customer’s consent to act. Disclosure of HMRC information through Deemed Consent is narrowly drawn and operating on PAYE, SA and NI Help Lines only. For those areas of work it is about changing the HMRC call handling guidance that is currently in place:-

• to provide more informative help to third parties in calls where the customer is not present (and therefore they can not be dealt with via Verbal Consent);

• to limit that help to the no risk or low risk giving/receiving of information about HMRC procedures while protecting customer data;

• to reduce the number of cases where HMRC would otherwise receive a paper consent form and a letter(s) or follow up calls;

Third party callers will be required to pass an ID check to enable Contact Centre advisers to deal with the call.

Where a customer is not present during a phone call with a third party and no authority to act is in place, the third party will not be provided with any personal information relating to the customer. If HMRC is required to send any correspondence as a result of the call then this will be directed to the customer not to the third party. This will ensure that we do not breach confidentiality under S18 of the Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005.