Penalty notices sent to wrong address

HMRC has admitted a security breach that has resulted in nearly 18 500 late filing penalty notices for 2019-20 being sent to the wrong address.

It became aware of the problem after reports from advisers who had received notices issued on 23 March which were not for their clients. In a letter to the Association of Taxation Technicians HMRC said: ‘We sincerely apologise for the recent security breach and recognise that this is not in line with our Charter standards. We take all aspects of protecting data very seriously so there has been a lot of activity to understand this incident and mitigate future risks.’

The department blamed a software problem linked to testing. The total number of individual penalty notices sent to the wrong agent is 18 496 and 15 459 agents were affected either by receiving notices they should not have...