The water companies using bailiffs to collect customer debt more than 6,000 times a year

Some water companies are instructing bailiffs as they try to recover customers' debt more than 6,000 times in a single year, new data reveals.

The information gathered by a committee of MPs has not been freely available before and reveals huge variations in water companies' use of the tactic. Wessex Water have not been using bailiffs at all over the last decade, and Welsh Water has used them less than 1,000 times in every year from 2019 to 2025.

But Southern Water instructed bailiffs 15,707 times in 2019, more than 6,000 times in 2020, more than 5,000 times in 2023, more than 8,000 times in 2024, and more than 4,000 times last year. The figures collected by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Efra) Committee show Yorkshire Water, United Utilities and Severn Trent as the other companies to have used bailiffs more than 6,000 times in a year.

And the MPs also highlighted South West Water/Pennon and Northumbrian Water as being among the most prolific bailiff users. Money blog: The cheapest day of the week to fly has changed The Efra committee used its position to reveal the figures because water companies are not subject to the Freedom of Information Act "despite providing an essential public service.