Inland Revenue Victim felt threatened

A recent Victim of the New Zealand Inland Revenue Department ( IRD ) was recently made to feel threatened by a staff member over $112.00, the victim says after attempting to tell the IRD officer that she didn’t have all the facts she said in a threatening tone that she could take (steal) the money from the victims bank account or even bring his home into the debt collection.

Even after the victim told the IRD officer she didn’t have the correct information a week later the victim received a copy of a deduction notice for over $700.00 from his mortgage account, such a deduction would have made it impossible for the victim to make his mortgage repayments. The IRD officer didn’t even check if the victim was telling the truth. “guilty until proven guilty should be the IRD’s slogan” says the victim.

The victim requested the tape of the phone conversation with the IRD officer but the victim was told “unfortunately the IRD don’t record certain conversations”. The victim then had to spend numerous hours of his own time correcting the mistake made by the IRD officer. 

The victim had the deduction notice stopped in time to save his home.

While this was happening the victim wrote two letters to the commissioner of the IRD (Robert Russell), his office acknowledged the first letter promptly. Then three weeks later the victim received what was thought to be an apology letter from the IRD officer, but instead the letter was an excuse to shift the blame to an Australian Government Department. The person replying to the victims letter… which wasn’t the commissioner Robert Russell, had obviously not read the victim’s letter properly as the commissioners office reply went on about reciprocal agreements and statutory obligation, nothing about the victim trying to tell the IRD officer that none of the facts she had were correct and even after telling the IRD officer she still continued trying to bully the victim into paying the incorrect amount.

During the victims stressful ordeal he would like to acknowledge that one staff member from the IRD did provide him with excellent service.

The amount in question was eventually forcefully removed from the victim, in the form of a deduction from his personal tax refund.

The victim is now expecting a check from the IRD as they have since (due to the victim’s hard work and effort in his own time) realized that the victim doesn’t owe the IRD. The IRD are now sending the rest of the tax refund that the IRD owe the victim. “hopefully the apology letter is in with the check” says the victim.