In her committee update to the States, she once again apologised to those waiting for assessments, repayments or responses to enquiries but said that matters were improving.
‘While service levels are certainly not where we want them to be, the position today is materially stronger than it was a year ago,’ she said.
‘We have, for the first time, clear visibility of backlogs, demand and operational pressures across the service. This gives officers the information needed to prioritise work effectively, target resources where they will have the greatest impact, and deliver recovery in a planned and controlled way.
‘We are at last at a genuine turning point. Officers are no longer focused on understanding the scale of the problem – they are actively addressing it.
‘Recovery will not happen overnight, but we now have the visibility, governance and control needed to make steady and measurable progress.’
Deputy de Sausmarez said that since March more than 13,000 items had been processed, including a backlog of 3,000 repayments now cleared.
The backlog of older personal tax cases has reduced by about 30%, debt recovery activity has restarted in a structured manner, and bereavement cases have been fully triaged.
2024 assessments will be released in a controlled and phased way to ensure that any resulting repayments can be processed promptly, and customer demand managed effectively.
‘While this progress is encouraging, recovery will take time. This is not a single backlog that simply counts down – work continues to enter the system every day while historical cases are being cleared,’ she added.
‘This is a phased recovery, not an overnight fix. Customers will see continued improvement, but not in every area at the same time.’
Work also continues to improve the systems, processes and data that support the Revenue Service.
The next phase will focus on longer-term transformation and future-proofing.
‘The objective is a stable, predictable service operating within clear and reasonable timeframes,’ said Deputy de Sausmarez.
P&R Treasury lead Charles Parkinson announced the previous day that the backlog amounted to 20,000 tax returns.