Challenge for HMRC to maintain records for Scottish taxpayers

Maintaining accurate address records of the 2.6 million Scottish taxpayers is the biggest risk for HMRC in ensuring that Scottish income tax is assessed and collected properly according to a report from the National Audit Office.

HMRC has now rectified issues that led to it failing to identify 420 000 people as potential Scottish taxpayers in 2015. The biggest challenge for the department is in keeping accurate address records of Scottish taxpayers. About 80 000 people in the UK move into or out of Scotland each year.

An online marketing campaign in the spring encouraged people to inform HMRC if they moved house. However the department does not know how many people it has reached or what impact it has had on public readiness to update it about changes of address.

In 2017-18 Scottish taxpayers will pay the higher rate of tax (40%) when they earn £43...