Summary warrants
A summary warrant is granted without a hearing and adds a statutory surcharge to your debt. It is the Scottish equivalent of a liability order.
A summary warrant is the order a Scottish council gets from the sheriff court to collect unpaid council tax. It adds 10% to what you owe, and lets sheriff officers arrest your wages or bank account. It is the Scottish equivalent of a liability order in England and Wales.
How it works
If council tax instalments are missed, your council sends a reminder and then a final notice. If the balance remains unpaid, it applies to the sheriff court for a summary warrant.
There is no hearing. The application is granted administratively, usually for hundreds of accounts at once. You do not receive a summons and you have no opportunity to argue the case beforehand.
The first you normally know of it is a charge for payment delivered by sheriff officers, giving you fourteen days to pay.
The 10% surcharge
When a summary warrant is granted, a statutory surcharge of 10% of the outstanding sum is automatically added to the debt.
This is fixed by statute, is not discretionary, and is not a penalty the council can waive as a matter of course. It is the strongest single argument for reaching an arrangement before a warrant is applied for.
What happens next
Once the charge for payment expires, your council can instruct sheriff officers to use any of the following diligences:
Earnings arrestment
Your employer deducts a sum from your net wages under statutory tables and pays it to the council. It continues until the debt is cleared.
Bank arrestment
Funds in your bank account are frozen and then transferred. A protected minimum balance is preserved, so an account cannot be emptied entirely, and certain payments such as benefits have further protection, but a bank arrestment can still be extremely disruptive, particularly if it catches your wages on payday.
Attachment
Sheriff officers may attach goods, but not inside your home without a separate court order called an exceptional attachment order. These are rare and require the sheriff to be satisfied of a number of matters first.
Goods outside the home, most commonly a vehicle, can be attached without one.
Money attachment
Cash and certain financial instruments on non-residential premises can be attached.
The twenty-year point
There is no time limit on obtaining a summary warrant equivalent to the English six-year rule in the same form. However, the underlying obligation prescribes after twenty years in Scotland.
If a council is pursuing very old council tax, it is worth checking the dates carefully and taking advice.
What to do
- Act before the charge for payment expires. Fourteen days is short, and an arrangement made within it usually prevents arrestment.
- Contact the council, not only the sheriff officers. The council instructs them and can recall the account.
- Check for unclaimed relief. The Scottish Council Tax Reduction scheme is a national one and is more generous than many English schemes. Discounts, disregards and exemptions work broadly as they do elsewhere in the UK.
- Consider the Debt Arrangement Scheme. A DAS freezes interest and charges and stops diligence entirely. It is the strongest protection available in Scotland short of insolvency.
A DAS payment programme stops arrestments. If a summary warrant has been granted and you have several debts, this is very often the right route. See the Debt Arrangement Scheme.
Questions people ask in Scotland
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