Your money · Spotlight on Spend
Council spending, 2018 to 2025
Every published payment over £500 made by Epsom & Ewell Borough Council across eight years, grouped by year, month, service area and supplier.
Total Spend
£157.0m
January 2018 – December 2025
Total Transactions
96,483
Individual payments recorded
Unique Suppliers
2,277
Suppliers paid over 8 years
Total VAT Paid
£18.2m
To HMRC across all years
Avg Transaction
£1,929
Per individual payment
Period Covered
8 Years
Jan 2018 – Dec 2025
Spend by Year
Annual gross expenditure 2018–2025 (£m). Hover a bar for details.
Why the 2022–2023 spike? The council administered £16.8m in Business Rates S31 Government grants, paid directly to local businesses. These are pass-through payments — not council expenditure — but are included in published spend data for transparency.
Month-on-Month Spend
Monthly gross spend Jan 2019 – Dec 2025 (£m)
Feb 2022 +682%
£8.7m MHCLG Business Rates grant — single largest month
Jan 2023 +559%
£8.1m MHCLG Business Rates grant received
Rising volumes
Transactions grew from ~1,000/month (2019) to ~1,400/month (2025)
Where Does the Money Go?
Top 10 areas of spend 2018–2025 (£m gross). Hover for details.
Business Rates S31 Grants — £18.2m
Government grant pass-throughs paid to local businesses. Not core council expenditure.
Homelessness & Temp. Accom. — £17.2m
Housing vulnerable residents in temporary accommodation — the fastest-growing cost area.
Domestic Refuse Collection — £11.2m
Collecting household waste and recycling across all 27,000 properties in the borough.
ICT & Technology — £8.3m
Software licences, hardware, cloud services, and IT support contracts.
Epsom Playhouse — £5.3m
Running the borough's main arts venue — productions, bar, and operational costs.
Grounds Maintenance — £3.6m
Maintaining parks, open spaces, verges, and green infrastructure across Epsom & Ewell.
Town Hall (operational) — £3m
Day-to-day running costs of the council's civic headquarters.
Parks — £2.8m
Capital works, facilities and improvements to the borough's parks.
Street Cleansing — £2.7m
Keeping streets, pavements and public areas clean across the borough.
Asset & Backlog Maintenance — £2.6m
Repairs and maintenance to council-owned buildings and infrastructure.
Top Suppliers Leaderboard
Top 20 suppliers by total spend 2018–2025
| # | Supplier | Total Paid | Transactions | Avg Payment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | Ministry of Housing (MHCLG) Government grant pass-throughs | £17.0m | 6 | £2833.3k |
| 🥈 | Matrix SCM Ltd Agency & temporary staffing | £8.3m | 7,808 | £1.1k |
| 🥉 | Specialist Fleet Services Fleet vehicle direct debits | £7.7m | 17,673 | £436 |
| #4 | Business Energy & Industrial Strategy Government grant payments | £5.2m | 10 | £520.0k |
| #5 | Surrey County Council Shared services & joint costs | £4.6m | 350 | £13.1k |
| #6 | Happy Homes (One) Ltd Temporary accommodation | £4.3m | 405 | £10.6k |
| #7 | Rydon Maintenance Ltd Building maintenance contracts | £4.1m | 3,282 | £1.2k |
| #8 | Happy Homes (Europe) Ltd Temporary accommodation | £3.1m | 403 | £7.7k |
| #9 | Churchill Contract Services Cleaning & facilities | £2.7m | 1,533 | £1.8k |
| #10 | London Borough of Sutton Shared services | £2.6m | 224 | £11.6k |
| #11 | Veolia Environmental Services Waste & recycling | £2.4m | 1,234 | £1.9k |
| #12 | HMRC Employer NI & PAYE | £2.2m | 96 | £22.9k |
| #13 | East Sussex County Council Shared services | £1.9m | 145 | £13.1k |
| #14 | Capita Business Services IT & back-office services | £1.7m | 678 | £2.5k |
| #15 | Epsom & St Helier NHS Trust Health & wellbeing services | £1.5m | 89 | £16.9k |
| #16 | Quadron Services Ltd Grounds maintenance | £1.4m | 456 | £3.1k |
| #17 | BT Group plc Telecoms & broadband | £1.2m | 345 | £3.5k |
| #18 | Mitie Group plc Facilities management | £1.1m | 289 | £3.8k |
| #19 | Abellio London Community transport | £980k | 112 | £8.8k |
| #20 | EDF Energy Utilities — electricity | £890k | 234 | £3.8k |
Key Insights
What the data tells us about how the council spends public money.
Homelessness costs have risen 8× since 2018
£17.2m over 8 years
From £535k in 2018 to £3.9m in 2025, temporary accommodation is the fastest-growing cost area. The council spent £17.2m housing vulnerable residents over 8 years.
Agency staff cost £12.3m over 8 years
7,808 payments avg. £1,064
Temporary staffing via Matrix SCM Ltd is the second-largest spend type. The council made 7,808 agency payments, averaging £1,064 each.
Fleet payments: nearly one a day for 8 years
17,673 transactions — £7.7m
Specialist Fleet Services received 17,673 direct debit payments totalling £7.7m — more transactions than any other supplier.
£8.3m spent on technology
4th largest area of spend
ICT is the 4th largest area of spend, covering software, hardware, and support contracts totalling £7.4m in maintenance costs alone.
1 in 3 suppliers paid just once
768 of 2,277 (33.7%)
768 of 2,277 suppliers received a single payment, reflecting a long tail of specialist and one-off contractors used by the council.
August and December are the quietest months
Avg £1.2m and £1.0m respectively
Summer and Christmas see significantly less spending activity than January and February, which consistently record the highest monthly totals.
VAT & Transparency Stats
A breakdown of VAT across all recorded transactions 2018–2025.
- VAT-inclusive transactions
- Zero-rated transactions
- Other / exempt
All figures cover January 2018 – December 2025. Includes government grant pass-throughs.
Data note
Data covers January 2018 to December 2025. For the forward looking 2026/27 position see the Budget page. All figures are gross (inc. VAT). Figures include government grant pass-throughs administered by the council on behalf of MHCLG and other government departments. Individual transactions below £500 may not appear in published data in line with council transparency policy. Source: Epsom & Ewell Borough Council "Spotlight on Spend" data releases.