I’ve been thinking about information I found in Any Answers around the incidence of HMRC enquiries. It struck me later that HMRC could really help the profession if it was to provide detailed statistics about enquiries.
It could start with high level data about the overall numbers of enquiries started, concluded and how those are spread geographically. I’d say by region and then down to county and town levels. I’d have this reported quarterly. An analysis of trades enquired upon would be useful as would a breakdown into different types of enquiry. The more detail the better but this need not be an all or nothing affair.
I know all the contra arguments but this is not difficult from a technology standpoint. The basic forms take no time to develop, neither does the basic analysis. Getting to or acquiring the data is another matter. As with all innovative ideas, the success comes in the execution. Michael Krigsman’s perspective, which talks to the management issues is instructive for all who engage with IT projects but particularly for a project of this nature.
If such a project was to acknowledge this has value for all participants then you’ve got the basis for helping practitioners better understand the enquiry landscape. The flip side is that practitioners could be encouraged to submit their own figures for comparison purposes. HMRC is already moving in the direction of greater consultation. See here for an online survey they are conducting.
Take this a step further. ICAEW, ACCA and the other governing bodies collate this data on HMRCs behalf. What might that reveal? How about the incidence of enquiries among non-regulated practitioners? This is an easy exercise to perform. The pic above shows you an example screen for data collection. Analysis on this data is a simple matter of creating different views and then adding in calculated fields to obtain different data slices.
Now it can get interesting. How about ‘exporting’ these views using RSS and then mashing up with Google Maps?
Technorati Tags: dabbledb, ethics, HMRC, innovation
