£450,000 in £90 refunds is sitting unclaimed. Some of it may be yours
What happened
The Insolvency Service is trying to give money back, and it is struggling to find the people it belongs to. On 28 September 2026 it urged people to claim a refund of the old £90 debt relief order application fee before the end of the year. Around £450,000 is available in total. Here is who is eligible. A debt relief order, or DRO, is an alternative to bankruptcy for people with less than £50,000 of personal debt. Until April 2024 there was a £90 fee to apply, which people paid in full or in instalments. The fee was scrapped in 2024. If you paid that fee between 2016 and April 2024 but never completed your application, you are owed the money back. Most people will be due a straight £90, though some may be owed more or less depending on what they paid. The Insolvency Service has written to affected customers several times since November 2025, but the refunds go back ten years and many people have moved or changed their contact details. Caroline Shanahan, a senior leader in the Insolvency Service's Personal Insolvency Team, said: 'We want to reassure customers that this is a genuine refund and we want them to claim their money back if it is due.' She added that people applying for a DRO 'may have been struggling financially - hence needing debt relief - so we're really keen to return money owed to them as soon as possible.'
Why this matters
Ninety pounds is not a fortune. But this money is owed to a very specific group of people: those who were in enough financial difficulty to start applying for debt relief, and then did not finish. That group is, almost by definition, the group least able to lose £90 and least likely to have a stable address over ten years. Which is exactly why the letters have not all arrived. There is a second reason this matters, and it is about trust. When an official-looking message arrives out of the blue saying you are owed money, the sensible instinct in 2026 is to assume it is a scam. Most of the time that instinct is right and it protects you. Here it may be costing people money they are genuinely owed. That is a real dilemma, and it deserves better than 'just claim it'. The answer is not to trust the message. The answer is to go directly to the source yourself, which is set out in the practical advice below.
What the evidence actually says
This is a genuine government refund scheme, announced through the Insolvency Service, which is an executive agency of the Department for Business and Trade. That is verifiable on gov.uk, which is the only verification that should satisfy you. The details are narrow and worth reading precisely, because scams thrive on vagueness while real schemes have boundaries: You are eligible only if you paid the DRO application fee between 2016 and April 2024. You are eligible only if you did not complete the application. If your DRO went ahead, you are not due a refund of the fee. The fee no longer exists, so nobody applying now has paid one. The total pot is about £450,000. At roughly £90 each, that suggests a few thousand people are affected. The Insolvency Service says it hopes to return as much as possible before the end of 2026. One thing the announcement does not say is that the money disappears after December. The push is to return it this year rather than a stated legal deadline. Still, there is no advantage in waiting, and agencies do eventually close schemes. It is also worth noting what a DRO actually is, since the coverage tends to skip it. It freezes qualifying debts for 12 months, and if your circumstances have not improved, those debts are written off. It is intended for people with low income, little spare money and few assets. There are eligibility limits, and it does go on your credit record for six years.
Practical advice
First, the safe way to check. Do not click a link in an email or text, and do not ring a number from a message. Go to gov.uk yourself, type 'Insolvency Service debt relief order refund' into the search box, and follow the official page. If a message and the gov.uk page do not match, trust gov.uk. Second, remember the rules that no genuine government refund breaks. The Insolvency Service will never ask you to pay a fee to receive a refund. It will never ask for your full banking passwords or a one-time security code. It will never pressure you to act within minutes. Any message doing those things is a scam, however convincing it looks. Third, if you think you might be eligible but are not sure, it costs nothing to ask. You paid the fee between 2016 and April 2024 and did not finish applying: that is the whole test. Fourth, and more importantly than the £90: if you started a DRO application and abandoned it, the underlying debt probably has not gone away. It is now free to apply. Debt advice is also free, and you should never pay for it. StepChange, National Debtline and Citizens Advice all offer free, confidential help, and DRO applications have to be made through an authorised debt adviser or charity anyway. Finally, a health point that is not a digression. Money worry and health problems travel together. People in debt delay prescriptions, skip doses to stretch a box out, and avoid appointments. If cost is affecting whether you collect your medicines, say so to your GP or pharmacist. An NHS prescription prepayment certificate can cut the cost substantially if you need several items a month, and some people qualify for free prescriptions altogether.
What to know
The Insolvency Service has around £450,000 in unclaimed refunds of the old £90 debt relief order application fee. You are eligible if you paid that fee between 2016 and April 2024 and did not complete your application. The fee was scrapped in 2024. The agency wants to return the money before the end of 2026 and has written to people, but many addresses are out of date. Check it yourself via gov.uk rather than through any link you are sent. No genuine refund requires you to pay a fee or share a security code. And if the debt that prompted the application is still there, free help exists - from StepChange, National Debtline and Citizens Advice - and applying for a DRO no longer costs anything. Sources: The Insolvency Service, 'Customers urged to claim debt relief order refund from the Insolvency Service before the end of the year', 28 September 2026, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/customers-urged-to-claim-debt-relief-order-refund-from-the-insolvency-service-before-the-end-of-the-year ; GOV.UK, 'Options for paying off your debts: Debt relief orders', https://www.gov.uk/options-for-paying-off-your-debts/debt-relief-orders ; NHS, 'Get help with prescription costs', https://www.nhs.uk/nhs-services/help-with-health-costs/get-help-with-prescription-costs/ This article is for general information and does not replace advice from a doctor, pharmacist or other qualified healthcare professional.
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