CRA gave accurate tax info to 17% of individual callers: AG report
Global News
Auditor General Karen Hogan's report said most callers waited an average of 31 minutes, with just 18 per cent of calls meeting the CRA service standard of within 15 minutes.
The Canada Revenue Agency’s contact centres provided accurate responses to individuals’ questions about taxes only 17 per cent of the time between February and May 2025, the federal auditor general said in a report released Tuesday.
Auditor General Karen Hogan’s office placed calls to the CRA’s contact centres over four months this year, asking general questions.
The report said the call centres were better suited to addressing business tax or benefits questions, and provided accurate responses to those calls 54 per cent of the time. The report said the “completeness” of responses to those questions was just over 30 per cent.
They were much worse at answering questions about individual taxes; the auditor general estimates the accuracy and completeness of responses to those questions at just 17 per cent.
The report said the CRA seems more concerned with adhering to schedules for shifts and breaks than with the “accuracy and completeness of information they provided to callers.”
In a media statement, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said the error rate of CRA call centres proves that “nobody understands the impossibly complicated rules and the government needs to simplify the tax code.”
“The Income Tax Act has become so long and complex that virtually no one can understand it,” said the federation’s federal director Franco Terrazzano. “Hiring more bureaucrats to give even more wrong answers won’t actually fix the problem.”
Just 18 per cent of incoming calls this year met the CRA service standard by being answered within 15 minutes, Hogan’s report said. Most callers waited an average of 31 minutes, she added.
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