The gap between what the Act says and what is in force is the whole story. It is routinely written up as a rewrite of Scottish debt law, and it is not.

Here is what has commenced, what has not, and what protection actually exists in the meantime.

Twelve of its twenty-three sections are in force, brought in by two commencement instruments in January and April 2025. What they cover is bankruptcy administration: recall procedure, an interest waiver on recall, Minimal Asset Process timing, appeal periods, a trust deed information document, and trustee resignation.

How commencement works here

Section 22(1) brought sections 21, 22 and 23 into force on 16 July 2024, the day after Royal Assent. Section 22(2) left everything else to a day appointed by Scottish Ministers in regulations.

Two such instruments have been made. That is the whole of the commencement history so far.

The commencement timetable

Two instruments people mistake for a third

SSI 2025/145, the Consequential Amendments and Forms Regulations 2025, came into force on 25 June 2025 and inserts trustee resignation forms. It commences nothing.

SSI 2025/403 turns up in the same searches and amends the Bankruptcy and Diligence etc. (Scotland) Act 2007, which is a different Act. Neither has anything to do with earnings arrestment.

Nothing in force touches wage arrestment. Sections 1 to 3 on the mental health moratorium, and sections 14, 15, 16 and 18 on bank arrestment, attachable funds, earnings arrestment and exceptional attachment, have never been commenced, and there is no third commencement order.

The eight that are still prospective

Section 7 belongs on that list too, and it is the only bankruptcy-administration section still waiting. Everything else outstanding is either the mental health moratorium or diligence.

Why that grouping matters

Parts 3, 4 and 6 are the diligence Parts, covering arrestment, earnings arrestment and exceptional attachment. Not one section in any of them is in force, so what a wage arrestment is in Scotland is unchanged by this Act.

The mental health moratorium is a duty on Ministers to make regulations, and those regulations do not exist.

A draft was consulted on and the responses were published in July 2025, with no timetable since. Nothing about it is law yet.

Section 1 is a power, not a scheme

Section 1(1) says the Scottish Ministers must by regulations make provision establishing a moratorium on debt recovery action against individuals who have a mental illness. Section 1(2) then lists what those regulations may cover.

So the eligibility criteria, the length, the debts covered, what creditors may not do and how any of it is recorded are all left to regulations. The Act itself tells you none of them.

What has happened so far

Scottish Ministers consulted on draft Debt Recovery (Mental Health Moratorium) (Scotland) Regulations, and published a summary of the consultation responses on 9 July 2025. On the draft, a mental health professional rather than the individual would start the application.

That is a draft and not the law. The consultation did not reach consensus on eligibility, and every element could change before anything is laid.

Why it is taking so long

Section 2 adds a step before the first regulations can even be laid. Ministers must lay the proposed draft before the Scottish Parliament for 60 days, have regard to representations, and then report on them, and the Accountant in Bankruptcy says commencement will follow when the regulations are ready.

Regulations under section 1 are also subject to the affirmative procedure. No implementation date has been announced, so treat any page that gives you one with suspicion.

No. Part 4 of the Act contains a single section, section 16, and it is not in force, so the deduction tables, the protected earnings thresholds and the employer’s duties are exactly where they were.

The three things readers ask about, all unaffected

Schedule 2 to the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987 is not amended by this Act. The current tables are those substituted by SSI 2024/293 with effect from 6 April 2025, and monthly net pay of £750.00 or less still produces a nil deduction.

The charge is set by section 71 of the Debtors (Scotland) Act 1987, which fixed it at 50 pence and let the Lord Advocate prescribe a different sum. Regulation 3 of the Diligence against Earnings (Variation) (Scotland) Regulations 2006 prescribed £1.00, with effect from 5 April 2006, and it has not moved since.

No section of the 2024 Act touches section 71, so the £1 employer charge and its instrument are unaffected as well. Nothing in the Act creates an affordability challenge against an earnings arrestment either.

The unduly harsh test in sections 73Q and 73R of the 1987 Act reaches arrestments over funds and moveable property, which means bank and third party arrestments rather than wages. What an unduly harsh application is and how you make one covers it.

Mostly service and disclosure rather than how much can be taken. None of it is law, and none of it should be relied on.

Section 16, on earnings arrestment

It would rewrite sections 70, 70A and 70B of the 1987 Act, adding electronic service of a schedule with employer consent and a deemed receipt rule for postal service. It would also turn the duty to respond into a duty on any person who receives a schedule rather than on an employer alone.

There would be a notification duty where the debtor does not work there or the deduction would be nil, and a cap on what a sheriff may order an employer to pay. What an employer’s legal duties are for a wage arrestment sets out the duties as they stand today.

Sections 14 and 15, on bank arrestment

Section 14 is the bank arrestment twin of section 16, and it would also fix a real gap. The penalty in section 73H of the 1987 Act is currently keyed to section 73F(4), which was repealed in 2022, and section 14 is the repair.

Section 15 is the one to watch. It would require Ministers to consult within a year on what should be attachable and on whether a debtor should be able to apply for arrested funds to be released.

That could eventually become a hardship route out of a bank arrestment. It does not exist now, and because the section is not in force the one-year clock has not started.

Three of the commenced sections do something a person would feel, and all three are about bankruptcy or trust deeds rather than diligence.

An interest waiver on recall of sequestration

Section 5, in force 25 June 2025, makes interest payable before a sequestration is recalled, but no interest is payable where the whole debt is paid in full within six months of the award. What sequestration in Scotland is covers the rest.

Partial payment inside the six months does not help. Interest then runs on the whole debt from the date of sequestration.

A trust deed information document

Section 10, in force 20 January 2025, requires a trustee to give you a trust deed information document and adequate time to consider advice before the deed is signed. It does not apply to deeds granted before that date, and what a protected trust deed is explains what you would be signing.

Trustee resignation where a debtor does not co-operate

Section 12, in force 25 June 2025, lets a trustee resign where the debtor has failed to co-operate for five years or more, with the Accountant in Bankruptcy determining non-co-operation. It is about keeping old cases moving.

The ordinary statutory moratorium under sections 195 to 198 of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 2016. It gives six months, it is open to anyone, and it has been running for years.

The two moratoriums compared

The six-month period replaced six weeks with effect from 1 October 2022. How do you apply for a statutory moratorium in Scotland sets out the process.

The limit that matters most on this site

It does not stop an earnings arrestment that was already running. Section 197(5)(d) of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 2016 lets a creditor carry on executing an earnings arrestment, a current maintenance arrestment or a conjoined arrestment order that came into effect before the moratorium began.

So a moratorium buys time to arrange something, rather than stopping a deduction already running. Can a statutory moratorium stop a wage arrestment goes through it.

What does end a deduction

An approved Debt Payment Programme under the Debt Arrangement Scheme recalls an existing arrestment, sequestration ends one on the date of sequestration, and a trust deed ends one on the date of protection. Does bankruptcy stop a wage arrestment in Scotland covers the insolvency side.

A time to pay order is the fourth route, and it is competent against summary warrant debt. What a time to pay order is sets out the limits.