The cost of asylum accommodation will triple to a wallet-busting £15.3billion over 10 years, spending watchdogs have warned.
The Home Office initially forecasted the overall bill, which includes hotels, to cost £4.5million between 2019 and 2029.
However, the 
240 per cent increase, suggested to be due to the surge in small boat crossings, was revealed in data released by the National Audit Office (NAO).
In 2024/25, the overall cost was £1.67billion, according to a separate breakdown from the NAO.
Migrants arrive on the Kent coast
PA
The Home Office started the decade-long taxpayer-funded contracts with three suppliers in 2019, ensuring the suppliers are responsible for finding a range of self-catering accommodation for asylum seekers dispersed across the country.
The suppliers, Clearsprings Ready Homes, Mears Group and Serco, are also responsible for sub-contracting hotels for tens of thousands of migrants coming across the Channel by small boat.
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Since the beginning of the year, 11,516 migrants have crossed from France
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Asylum hotels "may be more profitable" for the companies holding the contracts than other types of housing, the government's official auditors said.
Clearsprings is now set to be paid £7.3billion over the 10 years from 2019 to 2029, the NAO said, while Serco is expected to cash in on £5.5billion and Mears will receive £2.5billion, according to the report.
The study said: "The total reported profit of suppliers was £383million between September 2019 and August 2024.
"In the first five years of the contract, available data from suppliers show annual profit margins ranging from a loss of two per cent to a profit of 17 per cent."
It added: "This is equivalent to an overall seven per cent profit margin across the whole service.
"People accommodated in hotels account for 76 per cent of the annual cost of the contracts (£1.3billion out of an estimated £1.7billion in 2024-25).
"Data reported by suppliers suggests that hotels may be more profitable than other forms of accommodation.
"The number of people seeking asylum who are accommodated by the Home Office increased from around 47,000 in December 2019 to around 110,000 in December 2024."
The Home Office initially forecasted the overall bill to cost 4.5 million between 2019 and 2029
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William Yarwood, media campaign manager at the TaxPayers' Alliance, told GB News: "Taxpayers will be rightly worried about the spiralling cost of asylum accommodation.
"Ministers have lost control, and it's hard-working Brits who have had to suffer the consequences due to their inability to sort out the small boats.
"The Government needs to get serious on illegal migration before these costs jump even higher."
However, a Home Office spokesman said: "As this report shows we inherited an asylum system in chaos with tens of thousands stuck in a backlog, claims not being processed and disastrous contracts that were wasting millions in taxpayer money.
"We’ve taken immediate action to fix it – increasing asylum decision making by 52 per cent and removing 24,000 people with no right to be here, meaning there are now fewer asylum hotels open than since the election.
"By restoring grip on the system and speeding up decision making we will end the use of hotels and are forecast to save the taxpayer £4billion by the end of 2026."
