Quarter of callers hang up on HMRC after long waits Figures, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, showed that 28pc of callers gave up midway through their call to the pay-as-you-earn helpline. This is up from 10pc in 2009, when the average waiting time was one minute 53 seconds. Last year, the average waiting time was five minutes 45 seconds. The revelation comes just months after Government figures showed that complaints to the tax office about delays in responses had increased by nearly a third. The figures showed that HMRC that received more than 76,000 complaints from customers in the last tax year, up from 73,000 last year, but down from 84,500 in the 2008-9 tax year. However, complaints over delays rose from 16,882 in 2008-9 to 22,185 in 2010-11 amid criticism that the tax office is keeping people waiting because of understaffing on its call centres. It has been a troubled two years for HMRC, which sent millions of wrong tax codes to taxpayer due to a new system in 2010 and 2011. HMRC also admitted earlier this year that it had sent incorrect penalty threats to 12,000 people. A damning report from the Treasury Select Committee last year described HMRC response to telephone calls as "patchy at best and unacceptable at worst." Fewer than half of taxpayers got through to HMRC on the first attempt, against an industry benchmark of 90pc, MPs said. The office faced criticisms on all fronts, including the accusation that "staff do not have confidence in management" and that attempts to save money had been partly responsible for poor service standards and a lack of experienced staff at a senior level.