The £79 bailiff compliance fee: what triggers it and what it covers

When a creditor passes a debt to an enforcement firm, the fee rules divide the work into stages. The first is the compliance stage. The £79 fixed fee for that stage is triggered by the firm receiving the instruction, not by anything the debtor does or does not do.

What triggers the compliance fee

The Taking Control of Goods (Fees) Regulations 2014 set out when each fee becomes due. For the compliance stage the trigger is the enforcement firm receiving the enforcement power — the liability order, warrant of control, or other authority — from the creditor. That happens in the firm’s office, before the Notice of Enforcement is sent and before any contact with the debtor.

In practice, the Notice of Enforcement is the moment a debtor learns the fee has been added. The notice must set out the enforcement costs so far, which at that point means the £79 compliance fee. The notice page explains what the letter must contain and how the notice period works.

What the compliance stage covers

The compliance stage covers all of the firm’s work from receiving the instruction up to, but not including, a physical visit to the premises. That includes preparing and sending the Notice of Enforcement, handling calls or letters about the debt, and processing any payment or arrangement made during the notice period. It does not cover a visit: the first attendance at the premises triggers the separate enforcement stage fee.

A stage fee is payable in full once that stage has begun. Paying the underlying debt in full during the compliance stage extinguishes the debt but does not remove the £79 fee: the compliance stage has already started.

The fee from 1 May 2026, and what it was before

Compliance fee from 1 May 2026

£79Standard scale and High Court scale

Compliance fee before 1 May 2026

£75 (old figure)Both scales — unchanged since 2014

Enforcement fee from 1 May 2026

£247Added on the first visit, standard scale

Before 1 May 2026 the compliance fee was £75 on both scales. It rose to £79 on 1 May 2026 as part of the first uprating of the fee schedule since 2014. A statement or letter showing the old figure of £75 is consistent with a case that began before that date and is continuing under the previous fee structure. The full picture of what changed on 1 May 2026 is on the 2026 rules page.

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Which debts it applies to

The £79 compliance fee applies to the standard scale, which covers council tax, business rates, parking and traffic penalties, magistrates’ court fines, child maintenance, and county court warrants of control. The same £79 figure applies to High Court writs of control. The compliance fee is the only stage where the two scales share an identical amount.

More than one debt with the same firm

Where a firm holds several enforcement powers against the same person and those debts can reasonably be dealt with together, regulation 11 of the Fees Regulations allows the compliance fee to be charged for each one separately. So if a council passes three liability orders to the same enforcement firm, three compliance fees of £79 can be added — one per debt — even if the enforcement and sale stages are charged only once. The full fees page covers how multiple debts are treated at each stage.

What comes next if the compliance stage ends without payment

Where a debt is not paid and no arrangement is kept during the compliance stage, the enforcement firm can send an agent to visit. That first attendance starts the enforcement stage and adds £247 on the standard scale, on top of the £79 already charged. On the standard scale the fixed fees are £79 at the notice, £326 once an agent has visited and £442 if goods are removed for sale, before any percentage fee on a larger debt.

Goods are taken away in a small share of cases: 2,624 of almost 3.7 million in January to June 2025. What happens far more often, with a car or without one, is cost. Of the cases that ended in payment in that period, 64% were paid at the enforcement stage or later, after an agent’s first visit had added the larger fee. The average fee collected on a case paid in full was £201, on the lower fees then in force.

Of the cases that ended in payment at the compliance stage, 36% were resolved before any agent visited. The remaining 64% reached the enforcement stage or beyond, meaning the £247 visit fee had already been added before the debt was cleared. Once the compliance stage has passed without payment, the cost of the case rises significantly regardless of what goods are present.