Poor service at Inland Revenue

THE EDITOR: Friends describe me as jovial and easy going, so that it is with a significant degree of disquiet that I relate my latest experience of disservice in the public sector. On July 7, 2003 at 12.30 pm I visited the Legal department of the Board of Inland Revenue to settle a matter involving the cancellation of an annuity Insurance Policy that would inform a disbursement of funds in my favour. Cognisant of service “horror stories” in this country and, in particular the Government services, I approached Trinidad House on St Vincent Street with a measure of anxiety.

The Legal department is on the sixth floor and strangely the elevator was designed to only reach the fifth. Trekking up a couple flights of stairs was no problem, but was it an omen for the shortfalls in service to come? On entering the department, I was immediately privy to a disgruntled client shuffling documents and venting his displeasure to the young lady behind the counter - the only BIR official in sight at the time. Infuriated that he wasted a trip due to a negligent officer who omitted information in his last visit, he stuffed his papers away, forecasting that if he left them in care of the department, they would surely be misplaced. Needless to say, time is to a busy man what votes are to a Democracy — critical. There were three clients preceding me, all wearing smirks, revealing they had not only become tolerant of “rotten” service, they delighted in reactions of others so opposed. While waiting, I noticed that 50 percent of the newly arrived clients quickly became agitated - the reason was clear. When serving a client, the BIR official was often required to move away from the counter and out of sight of all in the waiting area. Consequently, new clients were greeted with no attending officer or indication of when or if they will be assisted — seeing only waiting people. As a rule, customers seeking service that cannot be immediately addressed should ideally be officially acknowledged upon entering the establishment in question.

Acknowledgment is essential to any service-oriented business, making its omission in this BIR department the basic root of disservice. Soon came the surprise tantrum from a female security guard stationed behind the counter in response to eager clients seeking help from literally any official that came into view. This person would have fared better by keeping her mouth shut. Opening her sweater and motioning to her uniform, she barked at clients with words to the effect: “”Yuh see this, this is a guard uniform, I am not one of these officers!” She continued admonishing her male colleague this time. By this time, the attendant’s stress level was visible and played out in her tone of voice, body language and the dismissive manner in which she served me. In short, I had to produce the Assessment Notices for income years 2001 and 2002 to proceed with my matter. Interestingly , these are items that BIR’s “Returns” department has not yet generated. In fact, assessment/returns for Year 2001 are only now being processed while my data for 2002 has not yet been entered into the system despite submitting a month ago. Note that I must wait for BIR to generate and mail assessments for the income years mentioned, then having received the documents, return them to BIR — this time to the Legal unit. Was the advent of computer technology a total waste of money here?

Discerning the unintelligible aspect of data going back and forth and in an attempt to expedite an archaic process, I offered a suggestion. I asked the officer to make an internal notation/request to have copies of the required information sent to the Legal department before the originals are mailed to me. Her reply was emphatically in the negative. Grunting that a note would involve two different departments, I read her inference to mean this was beyond the norm and there can be no compromise — bring the assessments when you get them. Dismissed. I left that office a proud man, for I was a victim of detestable circumstances and maintained my cool in lieu of succumbing to a farce I did not deserve. Truthfully, I cannot condone the attending officer’s snotty service. Nonetheless, I understand the daily stress it was born of, working for an administration that fails to address the issue of acknowledgment to clients much less eternal back logs and redundant procedures — an authority that promotes insolent guards by indifference. This is the same management that intimidates taxpayers when they extort money from us for late tax return submissions and have the nerve to mail out tax returns when they see fit - even years after and devoid of an apology of conscience. Alas, for those “big boys,” it’s just another day in paradise.

DEXTER J RIGSBY
Mt Lambert