HMRC is building AI tools to go after rich UK taxpayers

HMRC has announced that it is developing new AI-based tools to help its officers investigate some 1.3 million wealthy people across the UK.

The revenue collector detailed the move in a new document which sets out how it plans to modernise tax collection going forward.

HMRC said that the tools will help its compliance officers find case information, more easily spot patterns and connections, and assess risks. It stressed that AI would ot replace humans in this process.

“For example, these tools could automatically bring together information from multiple case records and documents to produce concise case summaries, answer questions about complex cases, and highlight relevant evidence. They could also help officers quickly locate and navigate HMRC guidance, policies and procedures through natural-language search,” the tax authority said.

“We will build on these capabilities towards 2030 to reduce administrative effort, improve consistency, and support earlier, more targeted compliance activity. AI will support, not replace, human decision-making: HMRC colleagues will remain responsible for compliance decisions and will apply their expertise to the facts, evidence and customer circumstances.”

Identifying patterns amongst the wealthy

HMRC said that it was also committed to using AI to connect priority customer, ownership, and third-party data to identify emerging risks earlier and target compliance activity where it will have greatest impact.

“We will modernise digital tax administration for wealthy customers and their advisers and equip HMRC’s tax professionals with better-connected data, modern caseworking tools, secure digital channels and responsibly deployed AI, supporting better services and expert human judgement,” the group said.

“This will enable us to pre-populate more digital services each year and provide more targeted prompts to help wealthy customers and their advisers report accurately and correct errors earlier.”

HMRC already receives information from more than 100 jurisdictions on approximately 12 million offshore financial accounts each year. To ensure that these people are paying tax, HMRC said it also plans to ramp um human hiring.

“We will bring in, retain, develop and share specialist expertise in areas including wealth management, family offices, offshore structures, trusts and Inheritance Tax, directing that expertise to the areas of greatest risk, including delivering on our commitment to increase by 400 the number of HMRC specialists focused on tackling offshore non-compliance by the wealthy by 2030 to bring in additional compliance yield from these risks.”

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