Legislation – Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Act 2025
Changes to legislation:
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Changes and effects yet to be applied to Section 19:
- s. 19 coming into force by S.I. 2026/371 reg. 2(a)
Part 1Functions exercisable on behalf of public authorities
Chapter 4Methods of recovery
Recovery from bank accounts etc
19Requirement for banks to provide information
(1)
Before the Minister makes a direct deduction order in respect of a liable person’s account, the Minister must obtain and consider bank statements for the account covering a period of at least 3 months.
(2)
To obtain the statements, the Minister must give the bank with which the Minister believes the liable person holds the account a notice (an “account information notice”) requiring the bank to give the Minister statements for the account covering—
(a)
the 3 months immediately before the notice is given, or
(b)
such longer period, ending immediately before the notice is given, as may be specified in the notice.
(3)
An account information notice must—
(a)
contain the name of the liable person, and
(b)
identify the account (for example, by number and sort code).
(4)
The Minister may give an account information notice relating to an account only for the purpose of determining whether to make a direct deduction order in respect of the account.
(5)
At any time, for the purposes of determining whether to make a direct deduction order in relation to a liable person, the Minister may give a notice (a “general information notice”) to a bank requiring the bank to—
(a)
identify every account that the liable person holds with the bank,
(b)
for each identified account, give the Minister the following information—
(i)
a description of the type of account,
(ii)
identifiers for the account,
(iii)
if the account is a sole account, the balance of the account at the time that it is identified, and
(iv)
if the account is a joint account, the name of each other account holder, and
(c)
give the Minister—
(i)
the correspondence address that the bank holds for the liable person, and
(ii)
in the case of a joint account, the correspondence address that the bank holds for each other account holder.
(6)
The Minister may give—
(a)
more than one account information notice, or general information notice, in relation to the same payable amount;
(b)
more than one account information notice in respect of the same account.
(7)
A notice under this section must—
(a)
set out how and when the bank is to comply with the notice, and
(b)
explain that the bank may be liable to a penalty under section 54 if it fails to do so without reasonable excuse.
(8)
The bank must comply with a notice given under this section.
(9)
Subject to subsection (10), a bank that is given an account information notice, or a general information notice, must not notify any of the following people that the notice has been given—
(a)
the liable person;
(b)
any other holder of the account in respect of which an account information notice is given;
(c)
any other holder of an account identified in accordance with a general information notice.
(10)
The prohibition in subsection (9) ceases to apply—
(a)
at the end of the period of 3 months beginning with the day on which the account information notice or general information notice is given to the bank, or
(b)
if earlier, when the bank is given a notice under section 21(1).
(11)
Information given to the Minister in response to a notice under this section may be used by the Minister for the purpose of exercising the core functions but not for any other purpose.