Credit: Pxhere

HM Revenue and Customs has appointed Myrtle Lloyd as its new director general for the customer service group, which oversees online and telephone interactions with individual taxpayers, tax credits recipients, and smaller businesses.

Lloyd, who is currently chief operating officer of HM Passport Office and Registrar General for England and Wales, will take up her new role at the beginning of March and will be based in Liverpool.

The customer service group vacancy was created by the promotion of former DG Angela MacDonald to the role of HMRC deputy chief executive and second perm sec in July last year.  Karl Khan was appointed temporary customer service DG.

MacDonald said Lloyd, left, who also counts being the Home Office’s head of profession for operational delivery among her current roles, would bring a wealth of experience to HMRC.

Related content

• HMRC to bring together text, voice and email communications in £10m contract
• HMRC’s ‘limited data’ saw up to a million wrongly deemed ineligible for furlough
• MPs urge HMRC to examine whether Making Tax Digital is ‘reasonable and affordable’ for taxpayers before proceeding with rollout

“I’m delighted that Myrtle will be joining us to lead the customer service group,” she said. “2021 will no doubt continue to bring many challenges to the way we work and deliver as an organisation, and Myrtle is very well-placed to help us rise to those challenges.”

MacDonald also thanked Khan for his contribution as interim DG over the past five months.

Lloyd said HMRC had “delivered brilliantly during the pandemic” and that it would be a privilege to experience its professionalism and excellence first hand.

Last month HMRC perm sec Jim Harra acknowledged the department “had to impose on the patience of our customers” in terms of response times to calls during much of 2020.

Just-published statistics for November show a 12% increase in complaints from customers compared with the previous year.