This week’s TGIF considers the recent case of In the matter of Umberto Pty Ltd (in liq) [2018] FCA 541,which involved an application to appoint special purpose liquidators and to obtain the Court’s approval of their funding and legal arrangements.

What happened?

This week’s TGIF considers the case of In the matter of Specialist Australian Security Group Pty Ltd (in liq) [2018] VSC 199 in which the Court considered the priority of administrators' right to an indemnity out of company property.

Background

This week’s TGIF considers Gogetta Equipment Funding Pty Ltd v Mark & Liz Pty Ltd [2018] VSC 91, which examined a priority contest between competing equitable interests in property.

What happened?

This week’s TGIF considers the case ofIn the matter of Bean and Sprout Pty Ltd [2018] NSWSC 351, an application seeking a declaration as to the validity of the appointment of a voluntary administrator.

What happened?

On 7 December 2018, Mr Kong Yao Chin (Chin) was purportedly appointed as the voluntary administrator of Bean and Sprout Pty Ltd (Company) by a resolution of the Company.

This week’s TGIF is the second of a two-part series considering Commonwealth v Byrnes [2018] VSCA 41, the Victorian Court of Appeal’s decision on appeal from last year’s Re Amerind decision about the insolvency of corporate trustees.

In June 2017, the New South Wales Parliament introduced the Civil Liability (Third Party Claims Against Insurers) Act 2017 (NSW Act), designed to clarify the rights of claimants to proceed directly against insurance companies. But in the context of insolvent corporations, has it created more problems than it has solved?

The insolvency service has published the latest figures for complaints against insolvency practitioners made to the Complaints Gateway during 2016. The statistics indicate that the Gateway has received a reasonably steady level of complaints since it was established in 2013 but promisingly for practitioners the Gateway does appear to be weeding out more complaints with the Gateway having rejected 29% of complaints in 2016, compared to 18% in the Gateway's first year.

The Stats

In June 2013 the Complaints Gateway was established to provide a single entry point for regulatory complaints against insolvency practitioners.  The Insolvency Service has published an analysis of the complaints received by the Complaints Gateway in its first 12 months; the headline being an increase in complaints being made against insolvency practitioners from 748 to 941 complaints.

Pre-packs involve the pre-determined sale of a business before it enters administration, allowing a sale within days of an administrator's appointment. Examples of pre-packs include Dreams, JJB Sports and stockbroker Seymour Pierce. Pre-packs are a useful tool for the insolvency profession allowing businesses to be sold before being unduly damaged by the insolvency process, often saving jobs that might otherwise be lost.