The Judge granted substituted service so I don't think that would be a defence. Also as the OP has stated he now needs to pay ALL of his debts which he can't at this point in time. Therefore I think an annulment is going to be unlikely. The OP should take debtinfo's advice and seek professional advice asap

That is some story and you have my sympathies. When the company was liquidated was the official receiver appointed and is it the Insolvency Service now chasing the money? I would say that you need a specialist insolvency lawyer rather than a IP. What part of the country are you in and I should be able to point you in the direction of one

Why would the OP want to waste another £10 when he knows exactly where the money has gone. The subbies have entered into a CVA/IVA and the OP is now an unsecured creditor.

As you are not BR yet there is nothing to stop you from setting up a Ltd Company. However, as you are looking to lease assets and premises and the fact that you will be a new start up will mean that the landlord and asset finance people will probably wany personal guarantees from yourself. Dependant upon your credit file you may or may not be able to arrange to lease these. Also there is the fact that by giving PG's you will be increasing your own persoanl liabilities if you do file for BR in the future. Aside from this if you do get the business off the ground as a Ltd Co and subsequently go BR, as mentioned earlier you will not be able to remain as a Director of the Company. The business can carry on but will need another Director and you will not be able to take part in the management of the business. Why not set up as a sole trader due to the fact that you will more than likely have to give PG's anyway on behalf of the Ltd Co.

Agree entirely. The country is almost bankrupt as it is and all the Govt. can do is waste more money on chasing things like this. The best part is that the Insolvency Service itself is almost insolvent. You couldn't make it up!

If they won't play ball simply ignore them, don't file any returns or accounts with CH and they will eventually strike it off for you. If HMRC wind it up your ok because there is no o/d DLA and you are a creditor. I wouldn't waste any more time on it. Remember the company owes the money you don't.

It says on the DS01 form that you have to inform all creditors of your intention to apply for a strike off and send them a copy of the application. Emap are a creditor so by informing them you have fulfilled your legal obligation. Is it wortth the battle when you were going to close the company anyway? IMHO the answer is no.

As you haven't traded for three months it would seem that you no longer require the Company? I take it the company has no assets? If that is the case I would not bother wasting the time and effort fighting this but apply to have the company struck off at Companies House. You need to complete form DS01 and send to CH with a chque for £10. You also need to send a copy to all creditors with a covering letter stating the following - The company has insufficient funds or assets to formally go in to liquidation and hence invites creditors or members to issue winding up proceedings should you wish to do so. If it is not subject to any formal winding up proceedings; the intention is to apply for Strike Off under s.1003 of the Companies Act and a copy of the application is enclosed for your records. The fact that you have received payment within the last three months does not constitute trading and you have therefore fulfilled the criteria to file a DS01

Dizzy Yes the court costs would be included in the BR because they would be a liability that was pre you filing for BR. All you say to the OR is that you were confident of success in Court and that is why you pursued it and by losing you had no alternative but to file for BR. I can't see them being bothered about it to be honest

Whose name was the lease in or who owned the premsies. If you were just acting as Manager you are not responsible for the rates no matter what they tell you.

electrica - lets start again on this one. You have sent notice to HMRC stating that you intend to apply for a strike off and they have not done anything about this apart from object to the strike off. By writing to all notifiable parties (i.e HMRC) you have fulfilled your legal obligations in applying for a DS01 (strike off). Therefore you are now in a position to write to CH and object to the objection. You need to write to CH and enclose a copy of the notice you sent to HMRC informing them of your pending application. Since then you have had no further communication from HMRC regarding the DS01 and therefore you object to their objection because they have not applied to have the company wound up. However, even if the company does get struck off this does not help you personal tax liability. The issue of making dividends PAYE is that the income tax and NI on that would have to be paid by me as per the rest of my personal tax, surely? So again it becomes my personal issue and I will definitely have to pay it then. The company isnt liable for the tax of its employees, it comes out of the employees wage. The above is incorrect in that PAYE/NI liabilities are liabilities of the company and not yours. Therefore by re-stating the accounts to reverse your dividends to PAYE/NI you increase the company liability to HMRC and decrease your liability to them personally. I won't be able to keep my bank account In bankruptcy you can get a bank account with Natwest or Co-Op which also has online banking and allows DD’s and SO’s. I have no reason to question what your VAT inspector friend has told you and would have thought he would have been best placed to know the inner workings with HMRC and how they deal with situations such as your own. Therefore it would seem your options are; 1) As per your friends advice try and make a low F&F offer to HMRC and see what they say. 2) Re state the dividends to PAYE/NI to reduce your personal liability and do nothing with the company and wait for either HMRC to wind it up and face the Official Receiver or CH strike it off automatically due to failure to file annual return and accounts 3) Re state the dividends and object to HMRC’s objection as per advice above. 4) Do nothing and wait for either HMRC to wind it up or CH to strike it off. The problem with this one is that if HMRC wind it up your o/d DLA will still be there and the OR will want it back If anything in the above is not clear please ask

At the hearing of what petition? The company was applying to be disolved so there would be no hearing of any petition. Whilst true they could do this the reality is that for such a small amount it wouldn't happen. If she manages to get the strike off through there is no liquidation and therefore no investigation by the OR At the end of the day it's up to the OP what they want to do. She has had plenty of advice of the months and has chosen to ignore most of it

This is correct but if she has written to them informing them of the proposed strike off (as suggested some months ago) then she can produce a copy of the letter to CH and object to their objection and CH will let the strike off go through. Agree entirley with the rest of your post crabbingtime.

Send them this letter

You wouldn't have to as it would be a company debt and not yours! Did you do this because if you did you could send a copy to CH and object to their objectoin to your strike off because you had let all creditors know you intended to apply and they did nothing about it so the strike off should be allowed. I am trying to help you here and dealing with insolvent companies is what I do for a living!

debtinfo - thanks for letting me know

There is a minimum share capital for public limited companies: Before it can start business, it must have allotted shares to the value of at least £50,000. A quarter of them, £12,500, must be paid up. Each allotted share must be paid up to at least one quarter of its nominal value together with the whole of any premium. Did you send them the letter informing them they you intended to apply for a strike off? And the overiding point that you seemed to have missed is that you do not personally owe HMRC for the unpaid VAT and Corporation Tax the company does. This would only become a problem if the company is liquidated and the OR finds that you are liable for illegal dividends or alternatively an overdrawn DLA. So either do nothing and let HMRC wind the company up and then deal with the OR or get your accountant to restate the accounts showing that you took the payments as wages subject to PAYE/NI and not dividends. This will erradicate the problem of o/d DLA or illegal dividends and increase the liability to HMRC which the company is liable for not you.

Michael Your reasoning makes sense but I really can't seem to find a definitive answer on this. Also how would the OR know about any refund unless it was declared voluntarily?

My advice was to apply again even though the first application was objectedd to but this time write to them as suggested and inform them of what you are doing. In that way you have fulfilled your obligations to them. The alternative is, as crabbingtime stated, let them wind the company up but they will then pursue you personally for any overdrawn DLA With this share capital the company would not have been a PLC. My advice would be to ignore any contact with HMRC and see what they do and also apply for the strike off. HMRC have pretty much scrapped their time to pay scheme and are taking a fair tougher stance on creditors now but if you can get the strike off through you may swerve the bankruptcy route. HMRC could reinstte the company but for the sums you are talking about it is doubtful. Why would this be?

I refer you to the advicee I gave you some months ago about how to go about getting the company struck off. If you had acted on it then it would all now be over The advice was this Also when you apply for the strike off send a copy of the DS01 to the creditors as well.

dx is correct they can still put defaults on your credit file and with dates you have stated they should drop off in Feb 2012 (or six years from the date the default was originally entered). Your CF should also show the date the IVA was entered into

They can do it by using your last known address but have to get the courts permission to do so and show that they have made every effort available to them to contact you personally.

There is a bit of a way for them to go yet before a BR petition is presented to you. They can either go the CCJ route and then enforce it or go straight for a Stat Demand. They will have to make their best effort to personally serve you the SD before they apply to the courts for substituted service. You say they have emailed you and even though they have you phone number not called? Can you close this email account and open another? Also as yet they do not have a 'proven' debt even though you don't deny owing it. So the collection agency at present do not have any powers to force you to pay. The amount you think you owe against what they are claiming is probably because the collection agency have added their fees on to it. At the moment you can either ignore it and see what there next move is with regarding trying to enforce it or gain judgment or try to come to some sort of payment arranegment with them. Personally I would ignore them and see what happens but the choice is yours.

dx, playing devils advocate on this - as you say the accounts are now closed, BK discharged and the PPI was paid within premiums so you would think the repayment would be mine but was it an unkown asset of the estate belonging to the trustee at the time of BR and therefore they could have a retrospective claim on any refund or because they are no longer trustee they have no claim?

I think you may be right but when I was discharged I got a letter from the OR stating that 'any asset included in the BR estate (property which can be distributedd among creditors) that has not been realised continues to belong to the trustee'. It also says that he intends to apply for release as my trustee. I'm thinking 1) the PPI was notan asset of the estate at the time (or not a known asset and therefore not included) and 2) He is no longer my trustee because he as askedd to be released from it. Any thoughts?