This shocking story in the Daily Telegraph did not name the insolvency firm who built managed to charge a staggering £500,000 for the administration of a small company with 40 employees, see http://tinyurl.com/jwzlcmc.
It appears that secured lenders pulled the plug on this small shopfitting business, presumably to recover their secured loan. The article refers to 10p in the £1 being paid to unsecured creditors.
Given that secured loans are paid ahead of the insolvency fees and that these are paid ahead of unsecured creditors, then this business had significant assets. While the fees will have been justified as representing the time and costs incurred in performing their duties, administration fees also need to be proportionate. Stories like this don’t do the insolvency profession any favours.
Insolvency firms will always justify any adopted procedure and its associated fees but sometimes we might question whether they are justifiable. If there were sufficient funds in the business to pay such fees then why wasn’t an effort made to restructure and save it such as by using the much less expensive CVA (Creditors’ Voluntary Arrangement) procedure?
Indeed who was advising the directors and shareholders? Too often directors make the mistake of trusting the advice of an insolvency practitioner who is normally working for the secured or unsecured creditors. They rarely ever appoint their own advisors.
All too often a company in difficulty is closed down rather than being restructured. In most cases everyone loses out: directors, shareholders, unsecured creditors and employees.
The only “winners” in an administration are the insolvency firm and the secured creditor that appointed them.
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