Garnishee Order
The historic name for what current civil procedure calls a third party debt order — a court order requiring a third party who owes money to a judgment debtor (typically a bank holding the debtor's account) to pay that money directly to the judgment creditor instead, now governed by CPR Part 72.
Independent editorial summary — not the official statute text. Read the official version on legislation.gov.uk.
Enforcement of a money judgment against sums a third party owes the judgment debtor is now governed by CPR Part 72, headed "PART 72 – THIRD PARTY DEBT ORDERS." Rule 72.1 explains the Part's scope: "this Part contains rules which provide for a judgment creditor to obtain an order for the payment to him of money which a third party who is within the jurisdiction owes to the judgment debtor." Under rule 72.2, "upon the application of a judgment creditor, the court may make an order (a 'final third party debt order') requiring a third party to pay to the judgment creditor" the debt (or enough of it to satisfy the judgment and costs) that the third party owes the judgment debtor — most commonly a bank or building society holding funds in the debtor's account. The court must first make an interim third party debt order, which freezes the specified sum in the third party's hands, before any final order is made.
Before the Civil Procedure Rules restructured enforcement terminology, this mechanism was known at common law and under the old Rules of the Supreme Court as a "garnishee order" (from the Old French garnir, to warn — the third party being "warned" that funds were attached). The label persists informally, including among some banks, courts users, and older textbooks, but modern procedure and all current court forms refer only to the interim and final "third party debt order" under CPR Part 72.
Official sources
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