Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the performance of the (a) advice and (b) complaint system for the HMRC Tariff Classification Service.

HMRC provide advice through the Tariff Classification Service: classification.enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk. This is a dedicated email service for customers and provides help for non-legally binding advice on classifying goods.

In 2021, the Tariff Classification Service team received 35,745 emails and 99.4 per cent were actioned within the turnaround time of 5 working days. From January to August this year, the team received 14,009 emails and 99.4 per cent were actioned within 5 working days.

Complaints can be sent to HMRC through several ways. Once received, they are allocated to the appropriate team for action. Since January 2021, there have been no complaints for the Tariff Classification Service through the HMRC Complaints process, which can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/complain-about-hmrc.