What the UK owes you in 2026

Transport: trains, flights, parking, TfL

Transport is where most people first realise the UK has a real compensation culture. Four schemes, all reasonably easy to use:

• Train Delay Repay: most operators pay 25% of the single fare for delays of 15 minutes or more. £80 million plus is left unclaimed every year across the network. Full guide →
• UK261 flight compensation: for delays of three hours or more, cancellations, and overbooking. £220 to £520 per passenger depending on distance. 85% of eligible passengers do not claim. Full guide →
• TfL refunds: incomplete journeys, card clashes, and maximum-fare overcharges. Around £300 to £400 a year for a regular commuter who misses the occasional tap. Full guide →
• UK parking fines: 33% of council PCNs that go to challenge are overturned. The grounds that win, and how to challenge a private parking notice, in the guide. Full guide →

HMRC: tax reliefs and refunds

HMRC publishes lists of reliefs and overpaid taxes worth billions in aggregate, and only a fraction is claimed.

• Marriage Allowance: up to £252 a year, four years of backdating, free on gov.uk. About 2 million eligible UK couples have not claimed. Full guide →
• Uniform tax relief: £12 to £200+ per year depending on occupation, for any employee who launders or repairs work clothing themselves. Full guide →
• Professional Subscriptions: relief at your marginal tax rate on subscriptions to bodies on HMRC List 3. Full guide →
• Working From Home tax relief: £6 a week of additional allowance for employees required to work from home. Narrower than during the pandemic, but still real. Full guide →
• Overpaid PAYE / P800 refunds: HMRC issues around 4 million P800 reconciliations a year, with median refunds around £200. If you changed jobs mid-year, had two jobs at once, or were emergency-coded, you may be on this list.

Council Tax: discounts and band challenges

The biggest ongoing-value category for a typical household.

• Single Person Discount: 25% off, worth around £570 a year on average in England. Includes households where everyone else is a student, apprentice, or live-in carer. Full guide →
• Wrong Band Challenge: typically £200 to £400 a year ongoing plus a £4,000 to £12,000 backdated lump if your band is too high. Real risk that the band can go up, which the guide is honest about. Full guide →
• Severe Mental Impairment disregard: if a resident has dementia, a severe learning disability, or severe stroke effects and receives a qualifying benefit, they do not count as an adult. Up to a 100% exemption.
• Disability Band Reduction: if your home has features required by a disabled occupant, your bill is charged as if the property were one band lower.
• Council Tax Reduction (means-tested): covers low-income households; rules vary by council.

Housing: deposits and rent

• Tenancy Deposit Protection: landlords must protect deposits within 30 days. The penalty for not doing so is 1x to 3x the deposit, plus return of the deposit. Full guide →
• Tenant Fees Act refunds: landlords cannot charge for reference checks, inventories, check-outs, or renewals since 2019. Refunds of £50 to £600 per illegal fee.
• Rent overpayments on void Council Tax: if you moved out and your landlord kept charging Council Tax equivalents, you can ask for the period back.

Bills: water, energy, broadband, telecoms

• Water Surface Drainage Rebate: £30 to £120 a year if your home does not connect to the public sewer for rainwater. Most water companies backdate six years. Full guide →
• Smart meter missed appointment: £30 automatic compensation per missed install slot. Full guide →
• Broadband and landline auto-compensation: ~£9.76 per day for total loss of service after two working days, ~£29.15 per missed engineer appointment. Full guide →
• Warm Home Discount: £150 paid to most state pension recipients on Pension Credit; some other low-income households also qualify.

Finance: motor finance, class actions, banking

• Motor Finance Discretionary Commission Redress : FCA scheme opens 30 June 2026. Average payout ~£829 per affected agreement; ~£7.5bn total fund. Full guide →
• Mastercard Merricks class action: £200m settlement for ~46m UK adults resident here as adults 1992-2008. Full guide →
• Authorised Push Payment fraud reimbursement . Banks must now refund APP fraud under the Payment Systems Regulator's mandatory scheme (rules tightened October 2024).
• Section 75 chargeback: if you bought something between £100 and £30,000 on a credit card and the retailer failed to deliver, your card issuer is jointly liable. Useful escalator across many other categories.

How to prioritise these in your own head

The realistic order for an evening's audit:

1. If you are a married couple with one basic-rate taxpayer, start with Marriage Allowance. Two minutes of eligibility check, ten minutes of form.
2. If you live alone (or with disregarded adults only), claim Council Tax Single Person Discount. Five minutes on your council's site.
3. If you have ever had car finance, lodge a holding complaint with the lender now to be in line for the FCA scheme on 30 June.
4. If you were a UK adult between 1992 and 2008, bookmark mastercardconsumerclaim.co.uk for the registration window.
5. If you wear a uniform or pay a professional subscription, run the P87 on your Personal Tax Account.
6. If you rent and the deposit story feels off, check all three deposit schemes.

That is six items, an evening of effort, and a realistic £1,500 to £4,000 of refunds and reliefs in the first full-pass year.

How Untap helps

Untap watches your inbox for the recurring four (trains, flights, parking, TfL) and Nell, our voice agent, walks you through the one-off categories above. We do not file on your behalf and we do not take a cut of any refund. The whole product is free while we work out a sensible business model.

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