The below sets out key considerations when dealing with an extension of an administration at the end of the first-year anniversary.

Categorisation of a charge as fixed or floating will have a significant impact on how assets are dealt with on insolvency and creditor outcomes.

Typical fixed charge assets include land, property, shares, plant and machinery, intellectual property such as copyrights, patents and trademarks and goodwill.

Typical floating charge assets include stock and inventory, trade debtors, cash and currency, movable plant and machinery (such as vehicles), and raw materials and other consumable items used by the business.

Following our previous alert, in which we highlighted an issue with entries relating to registered security maintained at Companies House being incorrectly updated to indicate that they had in fact been discharged without the aware

Over the past week, reports have emerged about filings that have been made at Companies House marking a charge as satisfied, without the company's or relevant lender's knowledge.

There were rumours last week, which were simply that, because Companies House had not publicly announced any issue, but, as we have seen over the weekend and is now widely reported in the news, it appears that there have been at least 800 erroneous filings.

Monitoring Winding up Petitions

While not an everyday occurrence, a company being issued with a winding up petition is an eventuality that all providers of finance, whether on a secured or unsecured basis, will prepare for.

From a contractual perspective, facility agreements will include specific monitoring information covenants as part of the core relationship housekeeping, supported by a hard backstop of event of default triggers, with rights for debt acceleration, and (if applicable) security enforcement operating in tandem from that point.

Beware of Demand Letters

An immediate concern for any company is a threat to present a winding up petition made in an email or letter – regardless of the size of debt, whether the debt is disputed or the company has a counterclaim.

The consequences of ignoring such a threat can have an immediate and adverse impact on a business. Failure to respond can be used as evidence that the company is unable to pay and that can be used as evidence to support presentation of a winding up petition.

The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA has issued a consultation about proposed changes to its Guidance for Insolvency Practitioners. The aim is to clarify existing guidance and provide more information to insolvency practitioners (IPs) on how to deal with regulated firms.

This guide should not be relied on as a definitive guide to the legislation and should not be relied on as legal advice. The particular circumstances of any situation will need to be considered to determine if the overseas entity is one that is captured by the legislation, if the estate is a qualifying estate, and whether the beneficial owners need to be registered. As a result, this guide is intended only as a high-level overview.

This guide covers the position of property and land situated in England and Wales only. 

Can a Company Voluntary Arrangement (“CVA”) complete, but still remain in place and bind creditors?

The simple answer is yes; but it does require (a) the terms of the CVA to be carefully drafted to allow notice of completion to be filed before the end of the CVA term; (b) compliance with the terms of the CVA, and (c) careful consideration of the position of the supervisors, creditors and company.

On 5 April 2022, the UK government published the first review of the Insolvency (England and Wales) Rules 2016 (the Rules) (the Report). It is evident from the Report that many respondents took the opportunity to raise issues faced in practice, not just with the Rules, but with the operation of the insolvency legislation in general.