The End-to-End Debt Journey

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Executive Summary

The UK’s total outstanding consumer credit stands at around £240 billion, with unsecured debt averaging around £4,300 per UK adult. Approximately 2.8 million credit card holders are classified as being in persistent debt. Debt pressures extend across other essential sectors: household water arrears stand at around £2.1 billion. Energy debts reached £4.79 billion in Q1 2026, up from £1.45 billion at the end of 2020. Over one million households currently have no arrangements in place for the repayment of their energy debts. These high and often unsustainable debt levels pose a significant challenge to financial resilience, with unsecured liabilities by far the most likely to result in a County Court Judgment (CCJ).

CCJs are an important factor used in hundreds of millions of lending and other business decisions each year. However, for individuals in receipt of a judgment, there can be negative consequences. CCJs affect a recipient’s credit score, which can restrict access to mainstream credit. The number of CCJs issued in the UK has risen substantially since 2001. A growing proportion are made for lower value judgments – in 2025, the most common value of a new consumer CCJ was £283.

This report maps the journey leading up to, and on from, the receipt of a CCJ, in 5 key phases.

Phase 1 addresses the first phase of the debt journey, from the point at which debts begin to move into arrears to the point at which a creditor may choose to initiate court action1 . It details how this process and the regulatory frameworks which govern it vary by sector and depending on whether the debtor is an individual or a business, outlines the relevant timescales and addresses the role of other key actors, namely third-party debt advice, management and recovery agencies.

Regulatory frameworks governing pre-court debt management vary considerably by sector and debtor type. Consumer credit operates under statutory FCA regulation (Consumer Credit Sourcebook). Personal debts across energy, water, and mobile contract provision are subject to sector-specific statutory regulation, although ‘fairness’ guidelines in the mobile and water sectors are outcomes-based and non-statutory. Private parking debt operates primarily under voluntary trade association codes with limited statutory backing. This regulatory patchwork creates inconsistent consumer protection standards and may leave vulnerable customers at risk. Business debts in these sectors are minimally protected, leaving small businesses – with the exception of sole traders and small partnerships in the credit sector – more exposed to harmful industry practices.

Consumer credit lenders must monitor repayment patterns, initiate early contact upon payment difficulty, and offer appropriate forbearance options before escalation. Default notices must be issued after approximately six months of missed payments, and a 14-day remedy period is mandatory after issue. Energy suppliers must make proactive contact after two missed monthly payments and offer alternative payment arrangements before considering disconnection or prepayment meter installation. Water companies must contact customers twice using two channels before further action and cannot disconnect primary residences. Mobile providers face minimal statutory timelines, with regulation focused on outcomes rather than process. For personal debts, regardless of sector, both parties to a claim must adhere to the PreAction Protocol for Debt Claims (PAPDC) before litigation can begin, which mandates the issue of a formal Letter of Claim followed by a statutory 30-day window for response and an exploration of alternative dispute resolution. Business debts must follow the lighter Practice Direction – Pre-Action Conduct (PD-PAC), which warrants ‘reasonable’ rather than specific statutory response times.

A range of options are available for both individuals and businesses in arrears, at risk of, or subject to, legal action. These options vary according to debtor type, and their suitability varies according to a debtor’s individual circumstances. Some options – like bankruptcy – entail high up-front costs and may be out of reach for some debtors.

Creditors engaging with debt collection agencies or debt purchasers are subject to regulatory guidance regarding firm selection and ensuring fair customer treatment. However, this is non-statutory outside the consumer credit sector. Excessive contact, intimidating communication, and poor cooperation with debt advice charities by debt collectors pose major risks to consumers in the sector. Individual Voluntary Arrangement (IVA) providers are explicitly excluded from FCA regulation, which leaves the door open for predatory marketing of IVAs to vulnerable consumers, for whom they are unsuitable.

Phase 2 describes the process through which a money claim is submitted to court and its subsequent journey through the court system, the total flow of money claims in the UK, and users’ experiences of the courts in practice.

Individual claimants can submit money claims via the UK Government’s Money Claim Online (MCOL) service or a paper N1 form. Bulk claimants (primarily large companies) submit claims via the Civil National Business Centre (CNBC), which partially automates 3 the process. Defendants have 14 days from a claim being served to respond with either a defence, an admission, or an Acknowledgement of Service, which extends the response window to 28 days.

Defended cases are transferred to County Court Hearing Centres and allocated to the appropriate court track based on the value and complexity of the claim. If a debtor does not respond to the initial claim, a judgment may be registered in default. For bulk claimants, default judgments are registered automatically when defendants fail to respond. Individual claimants must manually request judgment after the response period has lapsed. Default judgments make up a significant proportion of total CCJs. The high volume of default judgments may be partially due to profound knowledge asymmetries between bulk claimants and defendants, which may prevent or deter the latter from engaging in the court process. Incorrect or outdated address information is also frequently responsible for claims being missed.

Evidence from the Civil Court Users Association identifies multiple systemic deficiencies: processing delays, difficulties contacting court staff, lack of procedural clarity, and inadequate system visibility regarding case progression. A 2017 survey found that only 51% of court users rated their experience as ‘good’, with 28% rating it ‘poor’. Key drivers of satisfaction included ‘being listened to’, ‘good information,’ and feeling able to accomplish necessary tasks. A lack of legal knowledge on the part of debtors may preclude equal access to justice.

Phase 3 outlines the role and responsibilities of Registry Trust pertaining to the handling and storage of judgment data. Judgment data is stored on the Register of Judgments, Orders and Fines for England and Wales and its equivalent for other UK jurisdictions. Registry Trust’s responsibility for maintaining this Register is statutory.

Phase 4 reviews the options for debt enforcement available to creditors, their efficacy and their implications for both debtors and creditors, as well as the avenues available to debtors faced with enforcement action.

Creditors pursuing a judgment against an individual debtor may employ either warrant or writ of control (seizure of goods/assets), an attachment of earnings order, a charging order (which secures outstanding debts against a defendant’s property), or a third-party debt order (which freezes a debtor’s bank account and deducts relevant funds). Enforcement against businesses may involve notices of enforcement (seizure of goods/assets, akin to a warrant or writ), or the issue of winding-up petition to compel liquidation. For creditors, writs of control involving High Court Enforcement Officers (HCEOs) are perceived as more effective than warrants involving county court bailiffs. This is largely due to underfunding and excessive backlogs in the latter system. Debt advice charities warn that both writs and warrants of control can be highly detrimental to the debtor, both psychologically and financially. Currently, no independent statutory regulator exists for HCEOs, though they must meet minimum standards under the High Court Enforcement Officers Regulations 2004.

Evidence from the debt advice sector indicates that aspects of current debt collection practices, including communication tone and wording, can deter individuals from seeking help. Many people experiencing financial difficulty avoid contacting creditors because they believe it will not benefit them and may negatively affect their credit rating.

When issued with a judgment, individuals may pay in full within 30 days to prevent it from being registered or pay after the 30-day window to have the judgment marked ‘satisfied’. In exceptional cases, a debtor may apply to have the judgment set aside and removed from the Register. However, application fees for setting aside (up to £313) may often exceed the value of the judgment itself. In 2025, the most common value of a new consumer CCJ was £283. Alternative options include instalment orders, administration orders (for debts under £5,000 owed to at least two creditors), and token payments. Business debtors may pursue Voluntary Liquidation or seek administrative dissolution (which liquidate the business and cease trading), enter a Company Voluntary Arrangements (which allows business to continue) or employ prepack administration (which restarts the business via a new company) on receipt of a judgment.

Phase 5 outlines the main uses of judgment data and addresses the downstream implications of a judgment for a debtor – including on credit score, access to credit, private renting and mortgages – as well as the potential for financial recovery.

Credit Reference Agencies (CRAs) use CCJ data to calculate credit scores. CCJs have a significant negative impact on scores. The exact weighting is determined by each CRA's commercial algorithm. Lenders purchase data from CRAs and apply their own interpretations to judgment data when making lending decisions. A 2017 FCA study found that 14% automatically declined credit to those with a registered CCJ, 36% considered lending based on CCJ characteristics, and 13% reviewed case-by-case. The 2019 FCA Credit Information Market Study identified discrepancies in credit information held across the UK’s three major CRAs, including information pertinent to lending decisions. Market concentration, high barriers to entry and weak incentives for data quality improvement contribute to potential market failures in the sector.

CCJs remain on credit file for six years regardless of payment status, though satisfied judgments may have lesser impact on credit scores and access to credit. Consequences include reduced mortgage eligibility, higher interest rates, difficulty securing rental accommodation, restrictions on employment in sectors requiring financial probity and limited access to mainstream credit. Evidence demonstrates a strong association between CCJs and subsequent engagement with subprime lending. Analysis also suggests that nearly half of high-cost borrowers, many with existing CCJs, were already heavily indebted when taking out additional high-cost credit.

The Government’s November 2025 Financial Inclusion Strategy will seek to expand access to free debt advice, establish new services for energy debt advice and calls for urgent reform of the IVA sector. Registry Trust has proposed recording partially settled judgments (currently unrecorded, potentially leading to overstated credit risk as well as disincentivising partial payment), shifting the responsibility for getting satisfactions marked from defendant to bulk claimant and including claimant data on the Register. The Government has announced its intention to include claimant data through amendments to the Register of Judgments, Orders and Fines Regulations (2005) – doing so will make it easier for debtors to identify creditors within the critical 30-day payment window to prevent judgment registration, in addition to providing analysts and policymakers with improved insight into sectors driving the increases in CCJs, and allowing regulators to more easily oversee compliance with fair treatment protocols.