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LITRG welcomes a DWP initiative to cut benefits claimants’ costs when calling their helplines and asks if HMRC will follow suit.

Introduction

Communicating with the Department for Work and Pensions (‘DWP’) is generally on 0800 numbers – a free call on a landline but expensive on a mobile, as was pointed out by the Social Security Advisory Committee in a recent report, entitled Telephony in DWP and HMRC: Call Costs and Equality of Customer Access. Currently 12% of UK households do not have a landline.

What has Changed?

Today the Department for Work & Pensions (‘DWP’) have announced that many calls made to their major helplines from mobile phones will now be at no cost to the customer.

This is a very welcome and positive move and shows what can be achieved when a major government department is determined to improve customer service.

From next week, six of the biggest mobile phone network companies will no longer charge their customers for calls to around seventy of the DWP’s 0800 numbers. These numbers include those mainly used by the low-income customers of the DWP, for example, for making initial claims of benefit and pensions, and to request emergency payments such as crisis loans.
 
The DWP have now reached agreement with O2, Orange, Tesco Mobile, T-Mobile, Virgin Mobile and Vodafone to end charges - companies which, between them, cover over 90% of the mobile market in the UK.

Contrast with HMRC

In our earlier article today, Contacting HMRC - Still a Nightmare, we commented upon a critical report from the Natinoal Audit Office about HMRC’s handling of their telephone systems. HMRC and the DWP have millions of shared customers so would it not have been possible and preferable to have concluded a single agreement covering both departments?

Another difference with HMRC is that many vulnerable people, such as tax credit claimants and pensioners, have to use HMRC’s 0845 numbers which, of course, is often a cost even for those that use landlines.

Lesley Strathie, the current Chief Executive of HMRC, was the person who put the 0800 numbers in place when she was at the DWP. Hopefully, this will now be top of her agenda for HMRC.