Back from the day before the day your new application is made. If a MAP award falls inside that window, a second MAP cannot be awarded.

The words the section actually uses

Section 2(2)(g) bars an award where one was made in the 10 years ending the day before, “or such other period as may be prescribed”.

No other period has ever been prescribed, so the ten years on the face of the Act is what operates. Anyone quoting five or six years for a repeat MAP is wrong.

Worked dates

The window ends on the day before your new application, so an award made on the tenth anniversary itself is still inside it. The first date that works is the day after.

mygov.scot and National Debtline both describe the same rule in plainer words.

The bar is on the award, not on the application

An application refused or withdrawn before a decision starts nothing. What the section counts is an award that was actually made.

That is worth knowing if a previous attempt did not go through. It leaves you where you would have been had you never applied.

Where to find the award date

The award paperwork records it, and the Register of Insolvencies has a free public search, though an entry does not stay indefinitely. How long a MAP stays on the register covers what is published about that.

The award. Section 140(1) discharges you six months later, but section 2(2)(g) counts from the date sequestration was awarded.

Six months is not nothing

A case awarded on 1 March 2017 and discharged that September opens the door again on 2 March 2027. Assuming otherwise costs you half a year.

If money is already coming out of your wages, half a year matters. Check the date rather than estimating it.

Why people get this wrong

Discharge is the date most people remember, because it felt like the end. The Act refers throughout to an award of sequestration.

Neither is an award of sequestration, and section 2(2)(g) and (h) are keyed to nothing else. A live protected trust deed is a separate problem.

A previous debt payment programme starts no clock

Nothing in section 2(2) mentions a debt payment programme. A page telling you that a previous one bars a MAP for ten years has invented it.

That matters because the scheme is often the first thing tried. A MAP against the Debt Arrangement Scheme sets the two out side by side.

A trust deed that is still running is different

You cannot make a debtor application while a protected trust deed is still running. Section 172(1)(b) rules it out for as long as the deed subsists.

Section 172(1)(b) is not about repeat applications at all. It stops any debtor application for as long as the deed subsists, and AiB’s guidance on protected trust deeds says the same.

What counts and what does not

A trust deed that was converted into a sequestration is the exception, because that produces an award. What a protected trust deed is explains the arrangement.

Every condition in section 2(2), tested on the day the new application is made. Nothing carries over from the first one.

The eight, again

No minimum debt is currently prescribed for the Minimal Asset Process. The old £1,500 floor stopped applying on 6 February 2023, though the power to set one again remains.

A new certificate, with a short life

A certificate for sequestration under section 9 is required for every application, and regulation 10 gives it 30 days.

A certificate granted too early will not support the application. Advisers normally grant it once the evidence is gathered rather than at the first appointment.

The asset tests catch more repeat applicants than the dates do

Your assets must be worth no more than £2,000 in total under section 2(2)(c), and no single item may be worth more than £1,000 under section 2(2)(d).

The Accountant in Bankruptcy’s evidence checklist treats savings above £1,000 across all your accounts as defeating a Minimal Asset Process application. That is its practice rather than something the Act states.

Ten years is long enough for circumstances to change. How assets are valued against the £2,000 limit covers how little is published about valuation, and whether you are eligible runs through each condition.

More than most people are told. The bar in section 2(2)(g) closes the Minimal Asset Process and nothing else.

What is open, and when

The five-year point is the one nobody prints. Whether you can apply after a previous bankruptcy works through the interaction between the two bars.

The route that buys time immediately

A statutory moratorium lasts six months. The period was six weeks until section 23(2) of the Coronavirus (Recovery and Reform) (Scotland) Act 2022 substituted six months in section 198 of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 2016, with effect from 1 October 2022.

A statutory moratorium is the exception. 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.

How to apply for a statutory moratorium sets out the steps and what it does not cover.

Use the window rather than waiting it out

Ten years is a long time to carry unmanageable debt. Something in that table is usually available on the day you ask.

The right one depends on what you earn, what you owe and what you own now, rather than on what happened last time.

None of them is a soft option

A trust deed and a sequestration both appear on a public register and both reach your credit file for years. Weigh that alongside the eligibility rules.

Yes. The Accountant in Bankruptcy is the trustee, discharge is automatic at six months under section 140, and there is no application fee.

The same machinery applies

Paragraph 1 of Schedule 1 still disapplies the creditor claims and meeting provisions, so creditors are notified and receive nothing.

There is no fee to apply for Minimal Asset Process bankruptcy. The fee that used to apply was removed on 6 February 2023, and the Accountant in Bankruptcy’s own guidance lists no application fee.

And the same tail

The section 146 conditions apply again for six months after discharge, which which restrictions still apply after a MAP ends sets out in full.

mygov.scot reports 18 months on the register for a MAP and at least six years on a credit file, and no statute sets either period.

One thing that is not the same

A repeat award sits alongside the earlier one in your history. That is relevant to whether a bankruptcy restrictions order is considered, so be open with your adviser about the dates.

The clock resets

A second award starts a fresh ten years, and a fresh six months in which a change in your income can end the MAP modifications under Schedule 1. Whether a MAP can be transferred to full administration covers that.

A refusal can be reviewed, and the review decision appealed to the sheriff, under section 27(5) to (8) of the 2016 Act.

The timetable

Under section 27(5) to (8) there are 14 days to ask for a review, 21 days for representations, 28 days for the decision and a further 14 days to appeal to the sheriff.

Section 214 puts the grounds beyond doubt: fact, law or the merits. A date miscalculated is a matter of fact.

Better to check the date first

An approved money adviser has to be involved in any application, and checking the dates is part of what that stage is for. It is one reason the adviser requirement exists.

The Accountant in Bankruptcy’s published statistics for 2025-26 record 2,976 sequestrations, of which 2,415 were debtor applications.

What a refusal does not do

It does not start a fresh bar of its own. A refused application leaves the original dates exactly as they were.

Where to get the dates checked free

Citizens Advice Scotland, StepChange, National Debtline and council money advice teams all do this at no charge.

Bring the award letter and anything you signed with an insolvency practitioner. Whether you can apply after a previous bankruptcy covers the other bars, and whether you are eligible for a MAP covers the rest of the conditions.