Hundreds of callers to IRD threaten self-harm

Hundreds of people are threatening self-harm each year when they call Inland Revenue, though the tax department says the number of such calls is falling.

Since the beginning of 2016, Inland Revenue has received 822 self-harm threats, about half of which it had reported to police.

Deputy commissioner Mary Craig said it was encouraging Inland Revenue had only received 182 such calls so far this year.

That was down from 334 such calls in 2016, but was ‘‘still too many’’, she said.

Spokesman Rowan McArthur said some of the calls were attributable to child support matters, but there were a number of issues that could put people into debt and cause people stress. Sometimes tax worries were only one of the issues

that had built up for callers threatening self-harm, he said.

‘‘Child support would certainly figure in some. It is often an emotional issue. But there are a whole range of kinds of tax debt that can spiral,’’ he said.

Accident Compensation Commission spokesman James Funnell said it also logged all threats of selfharm but did not keep a record of how many such calls it received.

‘‘We do take all threats of selfharm very seriously, and alert the client’s GP, or the police, depending on the circumstances,’’ he said.

‘‘We have a guide for staff that is easily accessible on our intranet, and how to handle self-harm calls is a part of induction training.

‘‘We encourage our staff to keep the client call open until a safe responder arrives to their location,’’ he said.

Inland Revenue said it had no information on how many of its callers might be following through on their threats.

‘‘All we can do is focus on our job, which is trying to get people to engage early, before they get to the point of that sort of action,’’ McArthur said. ‘‘We have got ways of helping people and options.

‘‘I get that people are sometimes reluctant to get in touch with Inland Revenue for all sorts of reasons, but there are options – probably more than there have ever been.’’

Inland Revenue was also working with its staff to try to get them to engage with troubled callers in a way that helped them. The calls were also difficult for staff, he said.

‘‘There are a whole range of kinds of tax debt that can spiral.’’

Inland Revenue spokesman Rowan McArthur