Dudley Council coughed up more than £80,000 for damage to vehicles caused by potholes in the last five years.
Statistics published under the Freedom of Information Act lift the lid on how much the authority paid out between 2021 and 2025.
The total bill amounted to £81,903; the most costly year was 2024 when Dudley shelled out £28,884 to settle 180 claims, the least costly was 2022 when 69 claims cost the council £10,870.
In the years 2020/21 to 2024/25 the council repaired a total of 15,744 potholes and in January 2026 launched a ‘blitz’ to tackle dodgy road surfaces after carrying out more than 3,000 safety inspections.
Speaking in January, Cllr Simon Phipps, Dudley cabinet member for economy and infrastructure, said: “Like all local authorities, we have faced challenges with potholes with the winter conditions having had a negative impact on the highways in some locations.
“We have a continuous programme of works to repair potholes in Dudley borough and two years ago we launched a proactive service, which concentrates on permanent repairs rather than temporary fix, and includes our night-time pothole-blitz sessions to help us catch up on issues left over from the winter.
“Residents have given us some great feedback since this started, but with more than 700 miles of roads across the borough we know the work is never completed and we have more to do.”
The council is responsible for 1,033km roads in the borough, its maintenance budget in 2025/26 was £10.7m which was spent on a range of works including resurfacing, street light maintenance, signs and road marking, green area like verges and watercourse maintenance as well as pothole repairs.
Potholes are rated on factors including its size, location and how quickly it will get worse and are rated on a scale of one to 16.
Category 16 defects should be repaired within two hours while category eight and above should get fixed within 24 hours.
Lower risk potholes can be left for up to 28 days or programmed for repair ‘within due course’.
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