HMRC is not doing enough to help those who want to pay their taxes correctly. Taxpayers who want to pay their tax sometimes need help to get it right, and both the pandemic and the economic situation since have put pressure on people and businesses. Tax debt levels have risen again—from £39.4 billion in April 2022 to £45.7 billion in November 2022—rather than decrease as HMRC initially expected. HMRC has made changes to its debt management practices, including tailoring its approach to each taxpayer’s circumstances and ability to pay, and informing this with new data from credit reference agencies. It has improved its productivity at recovering overdue debts, which we welcome. However, this has still not been enough to stop debt levels rising due to the number of people finding it difficult to pay. HMRC’s customer services are also struggling with high call volumes, particularly at certain times of year, meaning those who need help to get their tax affairs right cannot always get support. Taxpayers who want to put their affairs right can find it hard to do so due to inflexible repayment practices and confusing correspondence from HMRC. Recommendation 4: HMRC should ensure it is providing sufficient support to taxpayers, big and small, who want to pay their tax. It should look at whether the additional staff it has secured for debt recovery work are sufficient, given it is struggling to keep up with demand even with better productivity.