How to Complain About a Bailiff or Enforcement Agent

This page sets out that route in order: the enforcement firm first, then the creditor who instructed it, then the independent bodies that sit above both. It also covers the one route that is not a complaint at all, a court claim for a breach or a defective instrument, which can result in goods being returned or damages being awarded.

If your complaint concerns one particular enforcement company, this site carries a page for that company with its specific contact details and any issues particular to that firm. This page is the general route that applies underneath all of them, whichever name is on the van.

Before you complain: what to keep

A complaint stands or falls on what you can show happened, not on how strongly it is worded. Before writing to anyone, gather:

• the enforcement firm's name and your reference number, both usually on any letter or notice you have been given
• the date, time and a short account of each visit or call, written down as soon as possible afterwards while the detail is fresh
• the agent's name and identification or badge number, if one was shown or given
• photographs of any paperwork left, any vehicle clamped, or any damage caused
• copies of every letter, text and email, including anything you sent back
• if a vehicle was involved, its registration mark and whether it belonged to you.

None of this is needed before you can complain at all. But a complaint that names a date, a document and a specific rule is answered differently from one that simply says the visit was unfair.

Step 1: complain to the enforcement firm

Complain to the firm first, in writing, before going anywhere else. Most other routes expect this step to have happened, and a firm cannot put right something it has not been told about.

A complaint to the firm should set out:

• what happened, in the order it happened, with dates and times
• which specific rule or step you believe was not followed, where you know it, rather than a general sense that something was wrong
• what you want done about it, whether that is a fee reversed, an inventory corrected, or simply an acknowledgement and an assurance it will not happen again
• copies of the evidence you have gathered, not originals.

Keep a copy of what you send and note the date it was sent. There is no single fixed statutory deadline for an enforcement firm to answer a complaint, so ask for a response by a stated date, commonly two to four weeks depending on the seriousness of what happened, and chase it in writing if that date passes with nothing back. The Ministry of Justice's national standards for enforcement state that "the debtor should be able to easily find out how to make a complaint and obstacles should not be placed in their way", which is a fair basis for expecting the firm to have a complaints procedure and to point you to it.

Step 2: complain to the creditor who instructed them

The enforcement firm did not choose to visit you. It was instructed by a creditor, and that creditor holds the case and can act on it even while the firm's own answer is pending. Who that is depends on the debt.

Writing to the creditor matters even when the complaint is really about the enforcement firm's conduct, because the creditor can pause or recall the instruction while it is looked into. The national standards put this in terms of the creditor's own duty: "creditors should act proportionately when seeking to recover debt, taking into account debtors' circumstances", and where something has clearly gone wrong, recalling the case is usually the fastest way to stop it happening again while the complaint is dealt with. See liability orders for what a council can and cannot do once one has been made, and CCJs and bailiffs for the county court route.

CIVEA, the trade association most private enforcement firms belong to, is not the place to send a complaint, and it says so itself. Its own complaints page states that "CIVEA is unable to consider complaints about its members" and that "the Enforcement Conduct Board (ECB) is now the body responsible for investigating complaints about CIVEA members". It adds that you must first follow the enforcement firm's own complaints procedure and show evidence of having done so before the ECB can consider your complaint, and that CIVEA itself "cannot give debt advice, legal advice or investigate individual complaints about enforcement action."

Step 3: the Enforcement Conduct Board

If the firm and the creditor have both had a fair chance to put things right and have not, the next step is the Enforcement Conduct Board (ECB), which describes its role as "independent oversight of the enforcement industry (bailiffs) to ensure that all those who are subject to enforcement action in England and Wales are fairly treated."

The ECB sits above individual firms rather than replacing a complaint to them, so raise your complaint with the firm first and keep the record of what it said. Contact the ECB directly through its own website for how it currently accepts and handles concerns about a firm's conduct, since a process description here would age faster than the underlying route.

Step 4: the Financial Ombudsman Service

For debts that began as consumer credit, such as a credit card, loan, catalogue account or a debt bought and pursued by a debt collection agency, a further route exists once the firm's own complaints process has been used: the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).

The FOS looks at complaints about businesses it regulates, which covers many lenders and debt collectors but does not cover a council recovering council tax or a court enforcing a fine, because neither is a financial services firm in that sense. If you are not sure whether the business chasing you falls within its remit, the FOS's own website is the place to check before relying on this route, and it should be used after the firm has had the chance to answer your complaint directly, not instead of that step.

Step 5: the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, for council debts

The Ombudsman route is real, but it is scoped by the debt, not by the firm, and that catches people out. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman says it can normally investigate a complaint about an enforcement agent's actions in collecting "council tax, business rates or traffic enforcement penalties", because in those cases "the enforcement agent is acting on behalf of the council". It also says it "cannot investigate complaints about the actions of bailiffs in recovering other debt because the enforcement agent is acting directly for the courts."

The same firm, and sometimes the same agent, can therefore be inside the Ombudsman's remit on a council tax account and outside it on a High Court writ or a magistrates' court fine. Work out which debt was being enforced before deciding whether the route is open to you.

Two conditions come with it. You should normally complain to the council first, and councils often run more than one stage, all of which you will usually have to complete before the Ombudsman will look at the case. And you should normally complain within 12 months of when you first knew about the problem, so a case left to drift can fall outside the window on timing alone.

For a council in Wales, the equivalent body is the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales rather than the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.

The certificate route: a Form EAC2 complaint to the court

Nearly every agent who calls at a home holds a certificate issued by the County Court, and that certificate is what lets them do the work at all. There is a complaint aimed squarely at it, and it is separate from everything above.

Under regulation 9 of the Certification of Enforcement Agents Regulations 2014, any person who considers that a certificated agent is not a fit person to hold a certificate may complain in writing to the County Court. The form is EAC2, "Complaint against a certificated person", and regulation 9(2) states that no fee is payable. The form tells you to send it to the County Court hearing centre where that agent obtained their certificate, which you can identify from the register of certificated enforcement agents.

The agent is given a copy and a chance to respond in writing before a judge considers it. If the judge is satisfied the agent remains a fit and proper person, the complaint is dismissed and there is no appeal against that. If the agent does not respond, or the judge is not satisfied, the complaint goes to a hearing at which the agent must attend for examination and you may attend or send written representations. Where the judge concludes after that hearing that the agent is not fit, the certificate can be cancelled or suspended, with conditions such as retraining before it is restored.

So the routes do different jobs, and they are worth keeping apart. The firm, the creditor and the Enforcement Conduct Board are about conduct and about putting your own case right. EAC2 asks whether this individual should hold a certificate at all. It is the more serious question and the slower one, so it suits conduct that would genuinely justify that, rather than a fee dispute or a delayed reply.

Court remedy: when the agent breached the rules

A complaint asks somebody to put things right voluntarily. A court claim is different: it asks a judge to order it. Under paragraph 66 of Schedule 12 to the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007, this route is available where an enforcement agent "breaches a provision of this Schedule, or acts under an enforcement power under a writ, warrant, liability order or other instrument that is defective." In those proceedings the court may "order goods to be returned to the debtor" and "order the enforcement agent or a related party to pay damages in respect of loss suffered by the debtor as a result of the breach or of anything done under the defective instrument."

That covers two different situations worth telling apart. The first is where the agent did something Schedule 12 itself does not allow, taking goods that were exempt or not the debtor's, for example. The second is where the underlying paperwork, the liability order, warrant or judgment, was itself defective, so that everything done under it is affected even if the agent's own conduct on the day was otherwise correct.

This is a genuine legal claim rather than a complaint, so it is worth getting advice on the merits and the practical steps before starting one, particularly on whether the loss can be evidenced and what it is actually worth pursuing for. It sits alongside, not instead of, the complaint routes above, and the evidence gathered for a complaint is usually the same evidence a paragraph 66 claim would need.

If you are vulnerable

Vulnerability changes what a complaint should ask for as much as it changes how it should be written. The national standards expect creditors to "consider the appropriateness of referring debtors in potentially vulnerable situations to enforcement agents" and, where somebody is identified as vulnerable, to "be prepared to take control of the case, at any time, if necessary."

That means a complaint on behalf of someone vulnerable can reasonably ask the creditor to take the case back, not only ask the firm to behave differently next time. Say plainly what the circumstances are, when they were or should have been made known to the agent or the firm, and what you are asking to happen as a result. See how bailiffs should treat you if you are vulnerable for what should follow once vulnerability has been raised, and Breathing Space if the underlying debts are unaffordable rather than the process itself being at fault.

What a good complaint should contain

Whichever stage you have reached, the same structure works:

1. Who you are and the reference number. Your name, address and the enforcement firm's case reference, and the creditor's own reference if you have it.
2. What happened, in order. Dates, times and a plain account, not a summary of how it felt.
3. What went wrong, specifically. Naming the rule, the regulation or the paragraph if you know it is stronger than a general complaint, but a clear factual account is still worth sending if you do not.
4. The evidence. Copies, not originals, of letters, notices, photographs and any written record you made at the time.
5. What you want to happen. A fee refunded, an inventory corrected, the case recalled, or simply confirmation of what was done and why.
6. A response deadline. State one, and note the date you sent the complaint so you can measure whether it was met.

If your complaint is about one particular company

Nothing on this page is specific to any single enforcement company; the same route applies to all of them, because it comes from where the case sits, not from who the firm is. If you already know which company visited you, look for that company's own page on this site first, since it will carry the contact details and any issues specific to that firm, and use this page for the wider escalation route once the firm itself has been written to.