The UK’s new high-earner middle-class trap
Lender Oakbrook has published new research showing that the most complicated repayment profiles in its dataset belong not to people on low incomes, but to higher earners in middle age.
People applying for credit in the UK aged 45 to 54 and earning £50,000 or more manage five or more separate credit repayments every month, the highest of any group measured.
The data is pulled from the UK Debt Repayment Complexity Index 2026 which is built from 4,299,599 anonymised credit records of people applying to borrow from an Oakbrook brand.
It measures something UK debt statistics rarely capture and focuses not how much people owe, but how many separate agreements they are keeping on top of each month.
Credit repayments climb
Across the whole population measured, applicants make an average of 3.5 separate credit repayments a month across 3.8 active credit products, paying £292 a month or £3,502 a year towards those commitments and using 48% of the revolving credit available to them.
Complexity follows a working life, rising from fewer than two repayments a month among 18 to 24 year olds to more than four between 45 and 54, before easing towards retirement.
The pattern inverts the usual assumption, Oakbrook said. A higher income supports wider access to credit, more applications are approved, and each approval adds another agreement to administer.
The group noted that a missed payment spread across five agreements on five different dates may be an administrative failure rather than an affordability one – and need different remedies.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has found that 23% of credit holders who received payment support in the two years to May 2024 could not find an option suited to their circumstances.
“More money doesn’t necessarily mean simpler finances,” said Claire Smith, Marketing Director at Oakbrook. “Higher earners in middle age have the most complex repayment profiles we measured, juggling five or more credit commitments every month. We’ve spent years talking about how much people owe. Perhaps we also need to start talking about how complicated we’ve made borrowing to manage.”
