Energy Savings Trust impaired debt statistics: EIR release

Information requested

Information relating to the debt repayment and recovery for domestic debts in arrears for the years 2018-present in relation to loans granted via Home Energy Scotland and/or The Energy Savings Trust. Specifically, I would like to get statistics on the following information:

1. Between 2018-present, how many debts fell into arrears?

2. Between 2018-present, of the debts with arrears, what number were sold to debt collection agencies?

3. Between 2018-present, of the debts with arrears that were sold to debt collection agencies in Q2 above, what number have had any amounts >0 recovered by the debt collection agencies?

4. Between 2018-present, of the debts with arrears, what number had legal actions taken against them?

5. What were the average costs of legal or recovery actions taken on a debt in arrears and of those costs what was the average amount recovered?

Response

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

I have included the information you have requested below.

For context, debts for loans funded by Scottish Government or Transport Scotland and delivered by the Energy Savings Trust are classified as “impaired” after 3 consecutive scheduled payments are missed.

The information provided relates to debts which are currently impaired and does not include previous impairments which have since been repaid.

1- Between 2018 – present, how many debts fell into arrears?

For the period between April 2018 and the end of September 2024, a total of 1,258 unique impaired debts are recorded across loan schemes administered by Energy Savings Trust.

2 - Between 2018 – present, of the debts with arrears, what number were sold to debt collection agencies?

No debts were sold to debt collection agencies between 2018 and the end of September 2024

3 - Between 2018-present, of the debts with arrears that were sold to debt collection agencies in Q2 above, what number have had any amounts >0 recovered by the debt collection agencies? 

No debts were sold to debt collection agencies between 2018 and the end of September 2024.

4 - Between 2018-present, of the debts with arrears, what number had legal actions taken against them?

No legal action was taken regarding any of the impaired debts between 2018 and the end of September 2024.

5 - What were the average costs of legal or recovery actions taken on a debt in arrears and of those costs what was the average amount recovered?

As no legal action was taken, no costs were incurred.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.