Had this response a while back if anyone is interested.


Quote:

HM Revenue & CUStOmS      Contact Centres Head Office Trinity Bridge House 5th Floor. West Wing 2 Dearmans Place Saiford M35DU Tel 0161 261 4221 Fax 0161 261 3463 www.hmrc.gov.uk Date      15 January 2007 Our ref Your ref * Dear Mr Freedom of Information Act 2000 I am writing to confirm that HMRC has now completed its search for the information you requested on 5 January 2007. * A copy of the information is enclosed. The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. You are free to use it for your own purposes, including any non-commercial research you are doing and for the purposes of news reporting. Any other re-use, for example commercial publication, would require the permission of the copyright holder. Most documents supplied by HMRC will have been produced by government officials and will be Crown Copyright. You can find details on the arrangements for re-using Crown Copyright on HMRC Online (internet access required) at: http://www.hmso-qov.uk/coDvright/licences/ciick-use-home.htm Information you receive which is not subject to Crown Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. You must ensure that you gain their permission before reproducing any third party (non Crown Copyright) information. If you have any queries about this letter, please contact me. Please remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications. If you are unhappy with the service you have received in relation to your request and wish to make a complaint or request a review of our decision, you should write to: Angela Sofield, Contact Centres Head Office, Trinity Bridge House, 5lh Floor, West Wing. 2 Dearman's Place, Saiford, M3 5DU. Information is available in large print, audio tape and Braille formats. Type Talk service prefix number- 18001 fl Head of Contact Centres: Linda Maslen      \      $ If you are not content with the outcome of your complaint, you may apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a decision. Generally, the information Commissioner cannot make a decision unless you have exhausted the complaints procedure provided by HMRC. He can be contacted at: The Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF. Yours sincerely June Taylor Freedom of Information Officer HMRC Contact Centres Head Office Floor 5 Trinity Bridge House Salford Taylor.June@hmrc.gsi.gov.uk Questions and Answers 1.      Geographical Number for Enquiries at the "Sheffield City Centre Enquiry Office'1. Ans: The number is 0191 501 6078. The Enquiry Centres themselves are not equipped to answer telephone calls. The number given is a geographic number for the South Yorkshire area and will allow a caller to arrange an appointment at the Enquiry Centre in Sheffield City Centre. 2.      Geographical Number for the Tax Credits Helpline (NGN Number: 0845 300 3900) (Sheffield Area). Ans: There is no relevant geographic number for the Sheffield area for Tax Credits. * 3.      Geographic Number for PAYE Tax Enquiries for Employees (To query overpayments on PAYE) Ans: This is 0191 501 6078 as already given at point 1 above. 4.      The amount of revenue received from the usage of 0845/0870 numbers. Ans: I can assure you that HMRC does not make any revenue from running these numbers. There is an annual cost to HMRC for the provision of these service from companies contracted to provide IT and telephony services." We use 0845 numbers, instead of geographical numbers, mostly as these numbers use the Number Translation Service (NTS). This service connects callers to specific non-geographic services rather than to a geographical location. This means that calls to our NTS numbers can be routed anywhere inside the UK. This allows us to route calls to the contact centre best able to handle them at the time of each respective call. Using this facility allows us to manage call queue lengths, reduce call waiting times and offer the best available service to our customers during our extended opening hours.  It also ensures that callers are not charged a higher rate for calls made to locations outside of their local areas. A geographic number does not offer these benefits.

Er, oh dear, haven't they rather missed the point in their final paragraph.   Do they REALLY still believe 0845 is cheaper for national calls?!    Dinosaurs or convenient ignorance???   Anyway, if you need to speak to YOUR tax office about a specific problem, my understanding is that speaking to any of the others won't help!