Reacting to the government press release “Government steps in to protect families from cowboy builders and aggressive bailiffs”, published by the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade on 28 August 2026, and announced by Prime Minister Andy Burnham with Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds and Minister for Courts and Legal Services Sarah Sackman; and to MoneySavingExpert’s report, in which Martin Lewis welcomes it. Every fee, notice period and entry rule below is read straight from the legislation and GOV.UK guidance in force today, with the arithmetic shown so you can check it.
Our view
Making Enforcement Conduct Board accreditation compulsory closes a gap: firms could previously stay outside a voluntary scheme. In the press release, Martin Lewis says some bailiffs “have got away with acting with impunity”.
Nothing announced this morning removes a fee, shortens a notice period or stops a visit. The cost to a household is set by a fee table rewritten on 1 May 2026, and by the notice deadline.
What changed this morning
Private bailiffs in England and Wales must now be accredited by the Enforcement Conduct Board themselves, or work for a firm that is, in order to obtain or renew the certificate they need to work. Until today, registering with the ECB was voluntary. Most firms had signed up; the smaller ones were not obliged to. Alongside it, anyone facing enforcement action gets access to an independent complaints process.
It covers private bailiffs only — the government is still considering whether councils’ own in-house enforcement teams come into scope. And the ECB, per MoneySavingExpert, gains binding rule-setting power and can strip a firm of its ability to operate, but cannot levy financial fines.
Why this takes up to two years to apply to everyone
Accreditation is enforced through the certificate, and under regulation 7 of the Certification of Enforcement Agents Regulations 2014 a certificate has effect, unless cancelled, for two years from the date it was issued. An agent certificated last month is certificated until 2028. So the requirement phases in across a full two-year renewal cycle from whenever the legislation commences, and the press release gives no commencement date at all.
The fee table that decides your bill
Enforcement fees are fixed in law, not set by the firm. They are in the schedule to the Taking Control of Goods (Fees) Regulations 2014, and the amounts were substituted on 1 May 2026 by the Taking Control of Goods (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2026. For enforcement other than under a High Court writ, the figures now in force are a £79 compliance stage, a £247 enforcement stage, and a £116 sale or disposal stage — with an extra 7.5% charged at the enforcement and sale stages on any part of the debt above £1,900.
Illustrative household, real statutory fees, England and Wales, rates in force from 1 May 2026.
- Debt referred to enforcement. Compliance stage fee £79 is added immediately, before anyone visits. You now owe £679.
- An agent attends. Enforcement stage fee £247. The debt is under £1,900, so no percentage fee applies. You now owe £926.
- Goods removed for sale. Sale or disposal stage fee £116. You now owe £1,042.
A £600 debt has become £1,042. The fees are £442, or 73.7% of the original debt. None of it is interest. On an illustrative take-home of £2,100 a month with £400 budgeted for food, that £442 is more than a month of groceries.
£79 of that £442 is unavoidable once the referral happens. The remaining £363 is a consequence of the visit. Acting during the notice period can prevent the visit.
Debts above £1,900
Above £1,900 the percentage fee starts, and it is charged twice — once at the enforcement stage and again at sale.
Illustrative. £3,000 − £1,900 = £1,100 of ‘excess’, and 7.5% of £1,100 is £82.50.
- Compliance stage: £79.
- Enforcement stage: £247 + £82.50 = £329.50.
- Sale or disposal stage: £116 + £82.50 = £198.50.
Total fees £607, turning £3,000 into £3,607. High Court writs run on a separate and much steeper table: £79 compliance, a £200 first enforcement stage, a £520 second enforcement stage and a £550 sale stage, with 7.5% above £1,200. On the same debt, that is roughly double the fees. If a creditor transfers a judgment to the High Court, contact a free debt adviser straight away.
Fourteen clear days, extendable to twenty-eight
Before an agent can take control of your goods, regulation 6 of the Taking Control of Goods Regulations 2013 requires a notice of enforcement given not less than 14 clear days beforehand. Sundays, bank holidays, Good Friday and Christmas Day do not count towards the 14, so the window is often longer than a fortnight on the calendar.
Since 1 May 2026, that notice period can be extended to 28 clear days if a debt advice provider makes a request on your behalf before the original period expires. It is free. The request has to come from an adviser and arrive before the 14 days run out, so contact one as soon as a notice of enforcement arrives.
Three things to do this week
- If a notice of enforcement has arrived, ring a free debt adviser today and ask them specifically about the 28-day extension and about Breathing Space. StepChange, National Debtline and MoneyHelper are all free and independent, and our money worries page lists them with numbers.
- Ask about Breathing Space. Standard protection runs up to 60 days and stops enforcement action, creditor contact, interest and charges — see GOV.UK on the Debt Respite Scheme. An adviser applies for you; you cannot apply directly.
- Read your rights before the door goes. GOV.UK’s bailiff guidance is short and specific: no entry between 9pm and 6am, no forcing entry to a home except as a last resort for criminal fines, Income Tax or Stamp Duty, and no entry at all if only under-16s or vulnerable people are present.
Our guides on clearing debt in the right order and budgeting basics explain priority bills, and the debt payoff calculator shows how long balances take to clear at different payments.
What is still uncertain
Commencement: the press release names no date for when mandatory accreditation starts, and the two-year certificate cycle means full coverage arrives well after that. Councils: in-house local authority enforcement teams are outside the scheme while the government considers them. Teeth: the regulator can withdraw accreditation but cannot fine. We will update this page when a commencement date is published.
Where coaching ends, and where to go if this is urgent. Everything above is public information and arithmetic, which is coaching territory. Choosing between formal debt solutions — a debt relief order, an IVA, bankruptcy — is not. Go to MoneyHelper, StepChange or National Debtline first — free, independent, and better placed than us on the day a bailiff is due. Buzz Money Coach is a trading style of Buzz Accounting Ltd, which is not authorised to give regulated financial advice and does not. Where regulated advice is what you need, we say so and can introduce you to Equity & General, authorised and regulated by the FCA (No. 474163) — optional, with no obligation, and E&G pays us a commission on introductions that convert.