14 December 2018:  When a company is in a formal insolvency process, such as a liquidation or administration, the directors could be criticised for allowing certain transactions to take place in the period leading up to the liquidation.  For example, a payment to a connected creditor, within 2 years of the liquidation, at the time...

12 December 2018:  BRI Business Recovery and Insolvency’s Northampton office held their last networking event of 2018 with their Christmas lunch at the Church Restaurant. The event finished with a game of “heads and tails” with the chance to win a Christmas hamper, which was duly won by Mark Charteress of Handelsbanken who collected his prize...

10 December 2018:  As you would expect, HMRC present more compulsory winding-up petitions against insolvent companies in England and Wales than any other creditor. In recent months BRI have noticed a sharp increase in winding-up petitions being presented by HMRC against dissolved companies with the intention of them being restored to the register and then placed...

6 December 2018:  In 2016, HMRC were given greater powers to tackle tax avoidance and evasion. A recent report issued by the House of Lords claims that HMRC are undermining the rule of law and justice as they are failing to reach a careful balance between clamping down on tax avoidance and aggressive tax evasion...

30 November 2018:  Below are details from Companies House’s quarterly release about the number of companies on the register, newly incorporated companies and removals from the register.

• Between July and September 2018, there were 164,424 new incorporations and 131,407 dissolutions in the UK. The number of dissolutions has continued to remain consistently high during 2018...

28 November 2018: Team members of BRI Business Recovery and Insolvency's Northampton office and their guests tried their hand at curling at Beckworth Emporium on Tuesday 27 November 2018. A great evening was had by all with no accidents being had and plenty of good old fashioned competitiveness. Below is a photo of all attendees and...

22 November 2018: In our Coventry office we have recently been dealing with three unrelated bankruptcies in which the bankrupts are solvent (assets greater than liabilities). We cannot be sure if there has been a recent increase in similar cases or if it just merely a coincidence that these three matters arose around...

8 November 2018: The underlying number of corporate insolvencies rose in Q3 against both the previous quarter and against the same quarter in 2017. The main driver for growth was in Creditors’ Voluntary Liquidations (“CVL”) which are now at their highest level since Q1 2012. Construction companies were hardest hit in the 12 months...

1 November 2018: Following much speculation as to the likely treatment of Entrepreneurs Relief in this weeks’ budget, the changes have, in fact, been modest. The whole Brexit, possible election and other disaster recovery plans mean that the sword of Damocles remains hanging over this most valuable relief in the medium-long term but, for...

26 October 2018: The Hitchin office has dealt with a number of cases where the directors of companies have received notifications from HMRC that did not make sense or where HMRC were claiming amounts that had already been paid. One company received a claim letter and a notice that HMRC would issue insolvency proceedings...

19 October 2018: In a recently reported case, a local authority had presented a bankruptcy petition against a debtor in respect of council tax arrears following a statutory demand. The council provided the debtor with evidence of the council tax liability orders confirming the debt. The debtor filed evidence in response which...

17 October 2018:  A director does not generally have personal liability for the debts of a company. However, at BRI we are seeing that, increasingly, directors hoping to save a company from the brink, will frequently put their own assets on the line, in order for the company to receive a much needed injection of...