Two dates matter more than anything else. You have four weeks from execution to lodge a notice of objection, and fourteen weeks before the money is released to the creditor automatically.

Below is what freezes, what is protected, and the two applications that get money back. If it is your pay instead, start with what a wage arrestment actually is.

A creditor instructs sheriff officers to serve an arrestment on your bank, and the bank freezes the funds caught by it that day. The money sits frozen until it is released to the creditor, released back to you, or dealt with by the sheriff.

Your bank has no discretion. The staff you reach on the phone did not decide it and cannot lift it.

Who serves it, and who they answer to

Sheriff officers are officers of the court, regulated under the Act of Sederunt (Messengers-at-Arms and Sheriff Officers Rules) 1991. They are not bailiffs, and their fees are set by the court and added to what you owe.

Complaints go to the firm first, then to SMASO, then to the sheriff principal. The firms working for Scottish councils include Scott & Co, Stirling Park, Walker Love and Alex M Adamson.

What freezes, and what does not

An arrestment attaches the funds held in the account when it is executed. How money paid in later is treated is a question for a money adviser rather than something to assume either way.

Get the date of execution in writing, because both deadlines below run from it.

Benefits and tax credits should not be arrested where they are clearly identifiable in the account. Banks do not always identify them, so you may have to raise it.

Cash in your home cannot be attached at all, apart from a narrow exception for antique or collector’s coins. Guidance on debt and decrees covers that line.

A protected minimum balance of £1,000 is left alone. An arrestment may attach only the balance above that figure, under s.73F(3)(a) of the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987.

The figure sits on the face of the statute rather than in regulations. Section 22(2)(a) of the Coronavirus (Recovery and Reform) (Scotland) Act 2022 wrote it into the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987 from 1 November 2022, and repealed the old uprating power.

Why £529.90 is still being published

£529.90 was the pre-November-2022 figure, set under the uprating power that no longer exists. Several pages ranking for this question still publish it, or something older again.

Treat any page quoting £529.90 as quoting a figure replaced in 2022. The £1,000 is also not uprated alongside the earnings arrestment tables, which changed on 6 April 2025 without moving it.

Personal accounts, business accounts and joint accounts

The protected minimum balance covers personal accounts, not business accounts, so a trading account gets no floor. Joint accounts are messier again.

The bank will usually freeze the balance above the protected minimum even where only one holder is the debtor. The other holder can claim their share back, but that is contested and slow.

The funds stay frozen and are released to the creditor automatically fourteen weeks after execution. Before that you have a four-week window to lodge a notice of objection, and you can sign a mandate releasing the money sooner if you choose.

Nobody hands you this timeline, and it is the thing to have in week one.

The bank arrestment timeline

Count from the date it was executed on your bank, not from the date you found out.

The fourteen weeks is not a grace period the creditor chose to give you, and it ends without anyone reminding you.

The four-week notice of objection

A notice of objection has to be lodged within four weeks of execution. Miss it and that route closes, even though the money is still sitting frozen.

The sheriff clerk at your local sheriff court can tell you what the court needs. Every page ranking for this question says you can object, and not one gives you the deadline.

A mandate is the opposite move, your written authority for the bank to release the funds early. Signing one throws the objection away, so take advice first.

Yes. Under ss.73Q and 73R of the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987 the sheriff shall order the funds released where satisfied that the arrestment is unduly harsh to you or to a dependant.

This is a statutory test, not a plea for sympathy. Competing pages reduce it to the phrase undue hardship and stop.

What the unduly harsh test actually asks

s.73R(2) says the sheriff shall order release, not that the sheriff may. Where the sheriff is satisfied, release follows.

s.73R(3) sends the sheriff to all the circumstances of the case. That expressly includes the source of the arrested funds, and whether an earnings arrestment, a current maintenance arrestment or a conjoined arrestment order is already running against you.

That second limb matters where one of the seven diligences against earnings is running as well.

s.73R(4) defines dependants as your spouse, your civil partner, a partner you live with, and children under 16. Harshness to one of them is enough, so it need not be unduly harsh to you personally.

How you apply, and by when

The application is made in Form 63G, under rule 69E of the 1988 Act of Sederunt, and it can be made at any time while the arrestment has effect. It is separate from the four-week notice of objection, so missing the four weeks does not close this door.

Does it reach a council tax arrestment?

Yes. s.73A(4) defines decree for this Part of the Act to include a summary warrant, so the unduly harsh route reaches a council’s bank arrestment for council tax.

Council tax is the most common trigger in Scotland, so that matters. Our council tax debt advice page covers the rest.

A bank arrestment catches a lump of money sitting in an account on one day. A wage arrestment takes a calculated slice of your net pay every pay day until the debt is cleared.

Readers mix the two up constantly. The difference that decides what you can do next is that only one has a hardship route.

The two diligences side by side

The wage side comes from the Diligence against Earnings (Variation) (Scotland) Regulations 2024, in force from 6 April 2025. On monthly net pay of £1,800.00 the deduction is £172.50.

Our wage arrestment calculator does the pay side. The bank side needs no calculation, because it is the balance above £1,000.

Why there is no hardship route against your wages

ss.73Q and 73R reach funds and moveable property. They never reach earnings, and there is no hardship ground against an earnings arrestment.

The only review powers over an earnings arrestment sit in s.50, a declarator that it is invalid or has ceased to have effect, and a determination of a dispute about how it is operated. Neither is an affordability ground.

A sheriff cannot reduce a Schedule 2 deduction because you cannot afford it, so the answer there has to come from a debt solution.

Getting that contrast wrong costs people weeks. How you stop a wage arrestment sets out the routes that do work against earnings.

A direct earnings attachment is a third thing again, running against pay rather than your account.

For an ordinary debt the creditor needs a court decree and must serve a charge for payment, giving you 14 days to pay. Council tax takes a different route, through a summary warrant.

Which route was used changes what you can argue about, so check which creditors can apply against your paperwork.

The ordinary decree route

The creditor sues, gets a decree, then has a charge for payment served under the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987. You get 14 days to pay in the UK, or 28 days if you are abroad or your whereabouts are unknown.

Once the charge expires the creditor can execute diligence, which includes bank arrestment, earnings arrestment and attachment of goods. A charge stays valid for two years from service.

The summary warrant route

Councils apply to the sheriff court for a summary warrant, supported by a certificate. There is no hearing and no chance to contest liability at that stage.

A 10% statutory surcharge is added to the outstanding council tax when the warrant is granted, and the same applies to non-domestic rates. No charge for payment is needed first.

The notices that should have arrived first are set out in our council tax billing and collection guide. A special payment arrangement is often what persuades a council to call the officers off.

Find out the date of execution first, because both deadlines run from it. Then get free money advice the same week, because a moratorium and the two court routes all work better early.

The first week

• Ask the sheriff officers for a copy of the arrestment schedule and the exact date of execution.
• Ask the creditor for a written breakdown of the debt, any surcharge and the expenses.
• Ask a money adviser about the Debt Arrangement Scheme and the statutory moratorium in the same conversation.

What a moratorium does and does not do

A moratorium is applied for through the Accountant in Bankruptcy, usually with a money adviser doing the paperwork.

A statutory moratorium gives six months of protection and you get one per rolling 12 months. It stops service of a charge for payment, stops new diligence and stops creditor petitions for sequestration.

It does not stop a creditor obtaining a decree, and interest and charges keep accruing throughout.

What happens to funds already caught depends on the case, so do not assume it unfreezes yours.

Longer-term options

An approved Debt Payment Programme stops an existing earnings arrestment and blocks new diligence, with interest and charges frozen and written off on completion. The average programme runs about six years, and council tax arrears can go in provided the current year is paid alongside.

A protected trust deed runs a minimum of four years for deeds granted on or after 28 November 2013. It takes effect on the date of protection under s.173 of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 2016, and appears on the Register of Insolvencies.

Between signing and protection you are still exposed, which is why a moratorium normally runs alongside. Sequestration works from the date of sequestration, and Minimal Asset Process counts.

Money already taken before any of those bites is credited against the debt, not refunded.

Time to Pay Orders

A Time to Pay Order is competent against a summary warrant, and the debt has to be £25,000 or less excluding interest. Where the sheriff grants one, the sheriff must recall any existing earnings arrestment.

For other diligence the sheriff only may recall, so a bank arrestment is not lifted automatically. A Time to Pay Direction is the pre-decree version, and that one is not available here.

It is not settled whether an earnings arrestment alone satisfies s.5(1)(b), so a money adviser or the sheriff clerk should confirm competency before you apply.