TTOG3345 - Case review and registration: considering all available sources of information: dealing with an excess of review cases
The Team Leader must always seek to use the resources of the Group to maximum efficiency. Any re-allocation creates a loss of efficiency and the Team Leader will avoid this by allocating cases carefully in the first place.
The inward flow of Submissions and Evasion Referral Process cases is not however within the Team Leader’s control. When there is excess we need to divide Review cases into two broad categories:
- Cases that must be acted upon urgently to comply with submission turnaround times and those that need to be dealt with urgently.
- Cases where the review can be deferred. Often these will be self-generated cases where either there are no files from other offices held, or where these can be returned for a while without inconvenience. (Where this option is being considered Investigators must think about the Self Assessment enquiry window).
A point can still be reached, after re-allocation within the Group and deferring those Reviews that can be deferred, where the obligation on the Group’s Investigators to complete Reviews within turnaround times, and deal with any investigation case registrations that came from those Reviews, exceeds their capacity.
Registerable cases should not be given up solely because an individual Investigator or a Group is up to capacity. This is particularly important in a case where there are grounds for suspecting fraud.
The Team Leader should discuss the matter with the Regional Head. It may be that there can be a reallocation of resources that can get the work done. If this is not possible then the incoming Review work - including in exceptional cases existing investigation casework - will be transferred to another SI Office.
The converse also applies. Where a Group is seriously short of registrations the Team Leader should alert the Regional Head to see what can be done.