'Ich bin ein storyteller', says UK taxman

Employers receiving HMRC's latest mailshot were confused to find the accompanying CD did not contain the promised payroll software but children's stories - read aloud in fluent German. The February edition of HMRC's thrice-yearly "Employer Bulletin" normally contains a CD of software designed to help small firms deal with …

[Michael]

Good job it wasn't Snow white and the seven dwarves

Apparently one version is a porno...!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ich Bin Ein Plonker!

Easy mistake to make, it must be quite hard to tell the difference between German Fairy Stories and UK Tax Laws.

[Marky W]

Won't somebody think of the children!!

Sitting there, excitedly waiting for storytime, glass of milk and bowl of sauerkraut in hand....

[Anonymous Coward]

ich bin confused

"HMRC's thrice-yearly "Employer Bulletin" ... The CD is updated and mailed out twice per year."

LE QUOI?!

Kanst du mir helfen bitte? your ingerlish ist sehr merde

[The Mole]

But think of the children ...

But think of the children who instead of getting some nice story time to send them to sleep instead get tax software!

[Sergie Kaponitovicz]

Minor Shit Happens

Not exactly "OMG Gov.uk screws up again" is it?

Whilst I remain 100% opposed to the Stasi database, this is a mistake by a third party that affected a miniscule amount of recipients.

Come on, there are more important issues than this.

And before anyone suggests it, HMRC never sends any personal or corporate specific info electronically or on disk, so 'No, this is not an example of future mega foul-ups"

Mind you, the next HMRC laptop or USB Flash Drive loss will be a different story.

[Chris Williams]

Re: ich bin confused

Umm... the Bulletin is sent out three times per year. Two of them are accompanied by a CD. All ist klar?

- Chris

[wsm]

@Ich Ein Plonker

Ahh, so that explains it. Tax laws, fairy tales, nothing new here...

[StooMonster]

Major Shit Happens

@ Sergie Kaponitovicz: "mistake by a third party"

Yeah, it's not like vast parts of the British state apparatus and the ID and Stasi databases aren't run by third parties is it?

Oh wait...

[Anonymous Coward]

mean while in Germany

"Ich bin ein Register"

Is reporting that German Copyright Lawyers are preparing a case against the pirates known as HMRC.

"prepare for boarding, me young buckaroos"

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously, it was a mistake.

That CD was presumably intended to have the personal details of half a million random taxpayers. But it got lost on the train on the way to the CD pressers, so they had to make do with a story or two.

[Des]

Ja bitte

Könnte ich eine deutschsprachige Kinder-CD wenden Sie sich bitte?

[Marie Bourgen]

YAWN - is this IT?

YAWN - is there nothing more serious to talk about....

So these guys produce some wrong disks..what 100 out of a million? Big Deal, but bravo Chris for making a 'berg' out of a 'molehaufen'

brrr...cold out here, back into my shell..

[david]

Commercial sensitivitiy...

...and it was on the label for all to see. I'd love to have been the one who pointed that out to them.

Priceless.

[Neil Lucock]

FACT

Now's the chance to report HMRC to FACT (federation against copyright theft), not the German lawyers.

It doesn't matter what your excuse is, if you distribute stuff without permission, you're guilty. Perhaps they can get a huge fine out of HMRC, enough to cover everyone's taxes? It seems like a good idea, perhaps we can then fight the winner and be rid of both forever?

Neil

[Steve]

The lady doth protest too much

"She stressed that there had been no loss of data..."

Why would their have been?

I can't decide if they think we're thick or if they just don't know what they're doing. I'm also not sure which alternative I like least.

[Anonymous Coward]

@ Ex-IT

>Easy mistake to make, it must be quite hard to

> tell the difference between German Fairy Stories and UK Tax Laws.

German fairly tales usually have a moral element.

[Dave]

Makes as much sense

As someone who doesn't speak German (I did an O-level and forgot most of it), the story disks would probably make as much sense as the tax ones whether I tried listening to them, reading the files or running them on a computer.

[Adrian Waterworth]

@The Mole

"But think of the children who instead of getting some nice story time to send them to sleep instead get tax software!"

It's OK, this is effectively a fail-safe event. If you've ever had to run even a small payroll, not to mention a payroll year end, you will know that the tax stuff will almost certainly get them off to sleep even faster than the stories would have done. God it's tedious...

[kain preacher]

@Adrian Waterworth

You want to put them to sleep not bore them to death.

God why don't have Ben Stein read the tax code to the kids.

[Lionel Baden]

@AC18:52

Hammer -> Nail -> Head

[Anonymous Coward]

not toooo bad

Like it. Worth a little laugh. Now something totally different and far more interesting ...

[klykx]

article title...

The title suggests a german fingermouse

[Anonymous Coward]

@Chris Williams

"All ist klar?"

that would be "Ist Alles klar?"