There is a second half to the question, which is what a lender then makes of it. That part is commercial, and this page says only what is actually published.

Here is what the regulations allow, what the mortgage rulebook requires of a lender, and what nobody has established either way. Our guide to how the Debt Arrangement Scheme works covers the scheme itself.

Because the programme is built on your surplus income. New borrowing takes a slice of that surplus and puts the payments your creditors agreed to at risk.

The credit you are allowed to take

The £2,000 limb was inserted by the Debt Arrangement Scheme (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2018 with effect from 29 October 2018.

An individual may take credit up to £2,000 without a variation, but not where they already owe £1,000 or more outside the programme, disregarding excluded rent and mortgage arrears on their home.

Why the restriction is not aimed at you

It protects the arrangement rather than punishing the borrower. Creditors accepted a longer wait on the footing that the surplus is spoken for.

That is also why there is a route through it. The list ends with credit approved by a variation, which is the door rather than the wall.

Two duties that come with permitted credit

Payments on credit taken under those limbs have to be made as they fall due, under regulation 27(2)(h). For the trade credit, emergency repair and funeral limbs you must give the prospective lender written notice of the programme first.

Breaking a standard condition without reasonable cause is a ground for revocation. That is the real risk in borrowing quietly.

Outside it. The regulations do not name mortgages, but a mortgage advance is credit and it is well beyond the £2,000 limb, so the only route is credit approved by a variation under regulation 38.

How that application works

Your money adviser applies to vary the programme. Regulation 37(1)(g) provides the ground, which is that the debtor requires credit to meet an essential requirement.

Creditors are notified and get 21 days to comment, and the DAS Administrator decides. How a variation works sets out the sequence and the deadlines.

The provision a lender should know about

Regulation 33(3) is unusual and it cuts against the lender. Where credit is given outside the permitted list, it is not competent to serve a charge for payment, to commence diligence, or to found on that debt in a sequestration petition, while the programme is approved.

So credit taken around the rules leaves the lender without the ordinary enforcement routes. That is a good reason to do it properly rather than quietly.

An existing mortgage is a different question

Your ongoing mortgage payment is a continuing liability you keep paying, and arrears on your sole or main residence can be left out of the programme under regulation 20(2AA). Whether rent or mortgage arrears can go in covers that choice.

Demonstrate that the mortgage is affordable. MCOB 11.6.2R is a prohibition rather than a guideline: a firm must not enter into the contract unless it can show that it is affordable.

The rulebook, requirement by requirement

Those rules are in MCOB 11.6 of the FCA Handbook, and the income figure is defined as income net of income tax and national insurance.

Where a programme payment shows up

Not in the income figure. A Debt Payment Programme contribution is expenditure you are committed to, and it is money that will not be available for a mortgage payment.

That is the honest way to think about affordability here. The question is what is left after the programme, not what your payslip says.

Almost everything a competitor page will tell you confidently. MCOB 11.6 does not require a credit reference search, does not tell a lender to read your bank statements, and sets no maximum loan to income.

The credit-impaired label

The FCA’s own definition of a credit-impaired customer has three limbs and each carries its own period. Limb (a) is overdue payments equivalent to three months’ payments on a mortgage or other loan, within the last two years.

Limb (b) is one or more county court judgments totalling more than £500 within the last three years. Limb (c) is an individual voluntary arrangement or bankruptcy order in force at any time in the last three years.

None of those names a Debt Payment Programme, a Scottish decree, sequestration or a protected trust deed. That does not mean a lender will ignore them, it means the label is not automatically attached to you by the rulebook.

What no source establishes

No published source sets out any lender’s criteria, scorecard, minimum income or deposit requirement for someone in a Debt Payment Programme. Where a page gives you a percentage or a waiting period, ask where it came from.

The useful version of that question is one you put to a lender or a broker about your own case. Anything else is guesswork with a number attached.

And the rules are moving

The FCA is part way through a mortgage rule review. PS25/11 was published on 2 October 2025, and CP26/18, which proposes changes for consumers with past credit difficulties, ran from 9 June to 28 July 2026 with a policy statement expected in the second half of 2026.

A consultation is not a rule. Check the current position before relying on anything written earlier, including this.

Not what most pages claim. No credit reference agency publishes a retention rule for a Debt Arrangement Scheme, because none of them lists one as a category at all.

What is published

No credit reference agency publishes a retention rule for a Debt Arrangement Scheme. Experian, Equifax and TransUnion all publish what they hold and for how long, and none of them lists a Debt Arrangement Scheme at all.

Experian’s retention page sets out the ten categories it holds and how long it holds them, and a Debt Arrangement Scheme is not among them.

The widely quoted six years is the rule for insolvency entries, and a Debt Arrangement Scheme is not an insolvency. What your creditors report is the state of each account, so ask them and check your own file.

What is probably happening on the accounts

Each account in the programme carries its own status with its own clock. That is where a lender looks, rather than at a scheme-level entry that no agency publishes.

Nothing published says how a Debt Payment Programme itself is reported. Treat any page that tells you otherwise with the caution it deserves.

What to do instead of guessing

Get your own file from each of the three agencies and read what your creditors are actually reporting on each account. Rebuilding your credit after a Debt Arrangement Scheme covers what helps.

The same discipline applies to a wage arrestment, which getting a mortgage with a wage arrestment deals with in the same way.

It is public, so anyone can search it. What is not established is whether any particular lender does.

What the register fixes

The DAS Register is free to search and open to anyone, and it is kept by the Accountant in Bankruptcy.

It records your name, date of birth and address alongside the events in the programme. What the DAS Register holds sets out the full list.

What is fixed and what is not

The line between those two columns is the honest boundary of this subject. Everything in the left column is answerable from published material, and the last row is not.

Start with your money adviser, not a lender’s website. Applying for credit without a variation breaches a standard condition of the programme.

Questions worth asking your adviser

• Would a variation for credit to meet an essential requirement be realistic in my case?
• How long is left to run, and would shortening the programme be a better route?
• What would my creditors be told, and when?

Questions worth asking a lender or broker

• How do you treat a Debt Payment Programme that is being repaid on time?
• What evidence of income and expenditure do you want to see?
• Would you look differently at an application once the programme has completed?

The other route

Finishing the programme changes the question entirely. Paying a programme off early covers the routes to that, and what happens when a programme ends covers what you are left holding.

If the worry is the house itself rather than a new mortgage, whether you lose your home in a Debt Arrangement Scheme answers that, and the scheme against sequestration for a homeowner compares the alternatives.

Our Debt Arrangement Scheme page sets out how we help.