Coerced debt as a form of domestic abuse: a practical guide for HR

When we talk about financial wellbeing at work, it’s usually about cost of living pressures, budgeting support, or salary benchmarking. Domestic abuse, financial abuse and coerced debt perhaps don't cross our minds.

Coerced debt is financial abuse. And financial abuse is a recognised form of domestic abuse.

From the moment you understand that, this stops being a “money problem” and becomes a more serious safeguarding, wellbeing, and business risk issue.

The scale of domestic abuse (and why this is a HR issue)

Domestic abuse isn’t a niche issue sitting outside of work.

• It costs the UK economy an estimated £66 billion every year

• That’s more than organised crime, roughly double

• And a significant proportion of that cost is felt by employers through absence, turnover, and lost productivity

  
  

Most importantly:

• Abuse doesn’t stay at home, it follows people into work

• Around 3 in 4 people experiencing domestic abuse are targeted at work in some way

  
  

So this isn’t hypothetical. This is already affecting your workforce, whether you recognise it or not.

What coerced debt actually looks like (and how control shows up in real life)

Coerced debt happens when someone is pressured or forced into financial commitments for someone else’s benefit.

That might include:

• Loans or credit cards taken out in their name

• Being forced to sign financial agreements

• Wages being controlled or taken

• Being left responsible for debt they didn’t choose

  
  

But in reality, it’s often not that neat or obvious.

I heard a story at a conference that’s stayed with me.

An employee had separated from her partner, but he still had access to the smart thermostat in her home. From his phone, he would turn the heating on full blast all day while she was at work.

She came home to the bill.

Over time, the costs stacked up to the point where she couldn’t afford to heat her home in the evenings or at weekends. She was sitting in the cold through winter, avoiding hot showers, just trying to keep the bills down.

No loan. No credit agreement.

But still control. Still debt. Still harm.

Financial abuse is evolving, and technology can be a part of it.

We’re increasingly seeing:

• Smart home devices controlled remotely

• Online banking monitored or restricted

• Spending tracked, questioned or punished

• Bills or subscriptions manipulated to create pressure

  
  

This is economic control. It’s about power.

And it rarely exists in isolation. It often sits alongside emotional, psychological and coercive control.

So when we talk about coerced debt, we’re not just talking about money.

We’re talking about someone’s ability to live safely and independently being taken away from them.

How coerced debt shows up at work (and how it’s often misread)

Domestic abuse is not always easy to spot, and so neither is coerced debt. Sometimes, the victim themselves may not even recognise themselves as a victim.

It can look like:

• Someone distracted, anxious, or on edge

• Repeated requests for pay advances

• Performance dipping without a clear explanation

• Calls from creditors during the working day

• Reluctance to engage with payroll or financial conversations

• Wages being paid in to an account that does not have their name on

  
  

We can unfortunately mistake this for:

• Poor performance

• Lack of resilience

• Financial irresponsibility

  
  

But when it comes to coerced debt and domestic abuse, the issue isn’t capability, it’s control.

The impact of domestic abuse on presenteeism, and hidden productivity loss

Financial stress doesn’t just drive absence, it drives presenteeism. People are physically at work, but mentally somewhere else.

UK data shows employees can spend over 3 hours a week worrying about money while at work.

Now add coercion and control into that. This isn’t just distraction. It’s someone trying to function while managing fear, pressure, and often ongoing manipulation.

A practical framework for domestic abuse at work: Recognise, Respond, Refer

The Employers' Initiative on Domestic Abuse (EIDA) offers a simple, practical approach, the 3Rs:

Recognise

Understand what the signs might look like. Look for patterns, not just isolated incidents.

Respond

Approach conversations with curiosity and empathy, not assumption or judgement.

Refer

You’re not there to fix it, but you do need to know where to direct someone for proper support.

It’s straightforward. And it gives managers something they can actually use.

Mishandling domestic abuse and coerced debt

Most organisations don’t mishandle this through bad intent.

They miss it because they:

• Treat debt or financial stress purely as a financial education issue

• Apply policies rigidly without context

• Don’t recognise financial abuse as domestic abuse

• Focus on process instead of what’s driving behaviour

  
  

The risk?

You escalate performance or disciplinary action against someone who is already being controlled elsewhere, which can make issues worse as opposed to supporting resolution of them.

What employers can do to recognise coerced debt and domestic abuse

You don’t need to overhaul everything. But you do need to be deliberate.

Start with:

• Making sure your domestic abuse policy explicitly includes financial abuse and coerced debt

• Building awareness of what coerced debt can look like in practice

• Reviewing payroll confidentiality and access

• Signposting to appropriate external support

• Creating a culture where people aren’t immediately judged for financial difficulty

  
  

And most importantly, train managers to lead with curiosity and ask better questions.

“What might be sitting behind this?” will get you further than jumping straight to process.

Coerced debt is a HR issue and a business issue

If someone is dealing with coercion and financial control, it doesn’t switch off during working hours.

Organisations that understand this tend to see:

• Better retention

• Lower absence

• Fewer escalations

• Stronger trust

• More stable performance

  
  

This is about running a well-led business. Not ticking a wellbeing box.

If you take one thing from this, let it be that coerced debt isn’t just financial difficulty. It’s domestic abuse.

And once you see it through that lens, your response changes, and so do the outcomes.

Need support with this in your organisation?

At OneSource HR, we help organisations take a practical, commercially grounded approach to complex people issues.

From manager training to policy reviews and trauma-informed HR, we support businesses to respond properly, not just compliantly.

📍 UK-based HR consultancy✉️ help@onesourcehr.co.uk📞 01709 460500🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/onesourcehr