London-based collectors and solicitors recover your B2B invoices under English law — from Letter Before Action to CCJ and enforcement. First results typically within 20 days. You pay only when money moves.
We act for your creditor. Despite due demand, the above sum remains outstanding. Payment in full, together with statutory interest and fixed recovery costs under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998, is required within seven days of the date of this letter.
If payment or an acceptable written proposal is not received within that period, we are instructed to proceed without further notice: to register the default with the relevant commercial credit agencies, and to issue proceedings — including, where the debt exceeds £750, service of a statutory demand under section 123 of the Insolvency Act 1986.
Our solicitors are instructed and in possession of the file.
This is what your UK debtor receives — from a London office, under English law. A Letter Before Action citing the 1998 Act and section 123 reads very differently in Manchester than a payment reminder from another continent. Hover the black bars — that is where your debtor's name goes.
English debt recovery runs on a fixed escalation ladder, and every UK finance director knows the cost of each rung. Tap a stage — see what the debtor receives, what it does to them, and what the law hands you next.
"Unless payment of £ ██,███ together with statutory interest and costs is received within 7 days, proceedings will be issued without further notice…"
"Finance director reached. Settlement proposed: ██ % now, balance in 14 days. Default reporting to trade credit agencies flagged."
"Statutory demand under section 123. Unless the debt of £ ███,███ is paid, secured, or compounded within 21 days, a winding-up petition may be presented…"
"It is ordered that the defendant pay the claimant £ ███,███ together with interest and costs, registered as a County Court Judgment…"
"Judgment transferred to the High Court. Writ of control issued — enforcement officers instructed to attend the debtor's premises at ██████████…"
Cosmodca runs this ladder for overseas creditors every day — a debt collection agency for the UK that demands, files, and enforces from London while you follow the case in one dashboard. Debtor elsewhere? See the international debt collection agency desk, the Germany desk, or the global coverage hub.
Creditors in the US, Canada, the Gulf, and beyond place UK cases with one desk — collectors and solicitors working from our London office at Canary Wharf, one dashboard in your time zone.
Debt collection in the UK is the recovery of overdue invoices from British businesses on behalf of the creditor — formal demands under English law, negotiation, credit pressure, and escalation from Letter Before Action through statutory demand and County Court to enforcement. For an overseas creditor, a debt collection agency for the UK runs the entire ladder from London while you keep one contact.
Your case reaches a London collector the same day. The debtor's Companies House record is pulled before first contact.
Live entity, filings, directors, insolvency signals, and payment behavior checked against UK registers and credit data.
Calls and a Letter Before Action citing the Late Payment Act — interest and fixed costs already running. Most cases settle here.
For undisputed debts over £750: a 21-day clock toward a winding-up petition. Few boards let it run out.
County Court proceedings through our solicitors. An undefended claim becomes a CCJ — six years on the debtor's record.
High Court Enforcement Officers, charging orders — then funds transferred with a full report. No recovery, no fee.
Three models cover nearly every UK commercial case. The percentage depends on claim age, size, and complexity. Court and enforcement costs are quoted and approved by you before any filing — and English law puts statutory interest and fixed recovery costs on the debtor's side of the ledger.
A flat-fee English demand sequence under your name — final demand and Letter Before Action with Late Payment Act interest attached. Escalates only if the debtor stays silent.
A success fee on the amount actually recovered. Nothing upfront. Nothing on failure. The economics only work when you get paid.
Statutory demands, court claims, and enforcement through our solicitors. For urgency, the fast debt collection service; for contested claims, attorney-based debt collection from day one.
A UK company ignoring an overseas invoice has usually made a simple calculation: you are far away, English proceedings are unfamiliar to you, and the debt will age quietly. What changes the calculation is not another email across the Atlantic. It is a Letter Before Action from Canary Wharf, statutory interest already accruing, a credit file about to take the hit, and a statutory demand drafted and waiting. Specialist B2B debt collection puts that machinery behind your receivable on a success-fee basis, with industry desks for manufacturing, logistics, technology, healthcare, and professional services.
UK debt collection follows a fixed escalation: a formal demand and Letter Before Action put the debtor on notice, a collection agency negotiates and applies credit-file pressure, and unresolved claims move to a statutory demand or County Court proceedings — producing an enforceable judgment against a debtor who does not defend. Enforcement then runs through High Court Enforcement Officers and, for companies that still refuse, a winding-up petition.
For a documented commercial debt, yes — a collection agency acts with the creditor's authority, and ignoring it does not make the debt go away. It leads to court proceedings, a default judgment, a County Court Judgment on the register for six years, and enforcement against the company's assets. UK debtors know this ladder, which is why a credible first demand moves most cases.
On the contingency model, nothing upfront: the success fee is a percentage of the amount actually recovered, quoted in writing before you place the case. English law also works in your favor — the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 entitles you to interest at 8% above the Bank of England base rate plus fixed recovery costs of £40 to £100 per invoice, charged to the debtor.
Under the Limitation Act 1980, a simple contract debt becomes statute-barred six years after it fell due or was last acknowledged. That sounds like a long runway, but recoverability collapses far earlier as debtors restructure, dissipate assets, or dissolve — the practical deadline is measured in months, not years.
Yes — and you do not need to sue at home first. For most unpaid invoices it is faster to pursue the claim directly in England through a Letter Before Action and, if needed, County Court proceedings, than to obtain a judgment abroad and have it recognized. Where you already hold a foreign judgment, our solicitors assess whether direct claim or recognition is the cheaper route before anything is filed.
Check the basics: a registered company at Companies House, a verifiable office, written fee terms before you commit, and reviews at scale rather than three testimonials. Note that FCA authorization applies to consumer credit collection — commercial B2B recovery sits outside that regime, so for business debts the meaningful tests are track record, transparency, and whether you can watch your case live.
The longer read for creditors doing their homework: how English recovery actually runs, how to judge a UK agency, the statutory demand and CCJ machinery in detail, what English law already owes you, and when placing a case is the wrong move. Open what matters.
A debt collection agency working the UK for an overseas creditor does four things you cannot efficiently do from abroad. It verifies the debtor against British registers — the Companies House filing history, the directors, the charges on the company, the early signals of insolvency. It applies pressure inside the debtor's own system: demands under English law with statutory interest attached, collector calls at finance-director level, and the announced prospect of a default on the company's credit file. It escalates through the instruments English law provides — Letter Before Action, statutory demand, County Court claim. And it enforces: High Court Enforcement Officers, charging orders, and where necessary a winding-up petition, all through solicitors who do this daily.
The alternative is instructing a UK law firm directly at hourly rates and coordinating litigation in a foreign system yourself. A specialist debt collection agency for the UK runs the same ladder on a success-fee basis, from a London office, and you deal with one contact and one dashboard.
The UK market is crowded and uneven, and the regulatory picture confuses many overseas creditors: FCA authorization governs consumer credit collection, while commercial B2B recovery sits outside that regime entirely. That makes the usual shortcut — “is the agency regulated?” — the wrong question for a business debt. The right questions: is it a registered company with a real office and named people; are the fee, the treatment of court costs, and the no-recovery scenario in writing before you place the case; can you watch collector activity live; and does its review pattern hold up at scale, where tens of thousands of rated cases are hard to fake and three website testimonials are not.
One more test specific to cross-border work: ask who conducts English proceedings. An agency that only sends letters, with no solicitors behind them, is bluffing — and UK finance directors have seen every bluff.
English law gives an unpaid commercial creditor a ladder with real teeth. The Letter Before Action is the formal pre-action step the courts expect, and it arrives with money already attached: statutory interest and fixed costs accruing by law. For undisputed company debts over £750, the statutory demand starts a 21-day clock at the end of which the company is deemed unable to pay its debts — the doorstep of a winding-up petition, and a document no bank, auditor, or credit insurer ignores. A County Court claim that the debtor does not defend produces a judgment in weeks; registered as a CCJ, it sits on the record for six years and follows the company into every credit application. Enforcement runs through High Court Enforcement Officers with a writ of control, charging orders over property, and third-party debt orders against bank accounts.
None of this requires the debtor to be spectacularly wrong. It requires a documented debt, correct procedure, and solicitors on the ground — which is precisely the machinery an overseas creditor lacks until they place the case.
Overseas creditors routinely under-claim in the UK. The Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 entitles you — as a matter of statute, not negotiation — to interest at 8 percentage points above the Bank of England base rate on late commercial invoices, plus fixed recovery compensation of £40, £70, or £100 per invoice depending on size, plus reasonable further recovery costs where the fixed sum does not cover them. Claimed properly across an aging ledger, these amounts routinely offset part or all of a success fee, which changes the economics of acting versus waiting.
And waiting has both a soft cost and a hard deadline. Industry data puts the recoverable share of a receivable near 94 percent at 30 days past due and below 30 percent past a year — and the Limitation Act 1980 bars simple contract claims six years after the due date. The expensive option is not the agency; it is the aging report.
Candor is cheaper than a wasted mandate. If your debtor is already in administration, liquidation, or a CVA, standard collection is the wrong instrument — the file belongs with insolvency counsel proving your claim in the process, and we will tell you so at assessment. If the debtor disputes what you delivered and the dispute is substantive rather than tactical, the case is litigation, not collection — and a statutory demand over a genuinely disputed debt can backfire. And if the claim is past the six-year limitation period, no collector revives it.
Everything else — the silent Ltd, the debtor who “never received” the invoice, the company betting an overseas creditor won't act in England — is exactly what this desk exists for. The assessment costs nothing and tells you which category your case is in. Debtors elsewhere belong with the international debt collection agency desk or the global coverage hub.
Free assessment · answer within one business day · no recovery, no fee
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