The Third Parties (Rights against Insurers) Act 2010 received Royal Assent on 25 March 2010. The Act modernises the Third Parties (Rights against Insurers) Act 1930 by streamlining the procedure by which a third party claimant can recover compensation from the insurer of a defendant.

HMRC clamping down on furlough fraud by companies in Danger Zone

The latest statistics show that over 11 million workers have been furloughed in the UK as part of the government's job retention scheme (that equates to 16% of the population or one in six people) and 41% of employers had staff furloughed. The scheme has so far cost the government over £40 billion and this figure will continue to rise until the end of September this year when the scheme is set to wind down.

When the Coronavirus Act 2020 (the "Act") received royal assent on 25 March 2020, commercial tenants across the country were afforded some relief.

Carillion, the UK’s second largest construction company, entered compulsory liquidation on 15 January 2018, with estimated debts of £1.5bn and a pension deficient of c£800m, following three profit warnings in 2017. The company employs 20,000 people in the UK and 43,000 people worldwide. It is thought that some 30,000 companies may be affected by the liquidation.

From 1 April 2016, conditional fee agreements (CFA), after the event premiums and success fees will no longer be recoverable in insolvency cases.

The legislative change is set to have the biggest impact on lower-value insolvency cases (damages less than £500,000 and legal costs lower than £200,000).

We are receiving numerous enquiries regarding the fallout from the bankruptcy of OW Bunker A/S and certain associated companies.  At this stage, some companies are in formal bankruptcy proceedings, with the Court protection that usually entails, but others are not. 

An administrator who was sued in relation to contractual liabilities which he entered as administrator of a company was found to have no personal liability for those contracts or for the costs of the litigation.

In the recent case of Wright Hassall LLP v Morris¹ the claimant advanced various arguments in an attempt to make the administrator personally liable for a costs order in litigation where the defendant companies were unable to pay. These arguments were rejected.

In December’s Real Estate Update, insolvency Partner Vivien Tyrell considered a landlord’s ability to forfeit a lease where the tenant is in administration. Closely linked to this is a landlord’s ability to recover rent from a tenant which is in administration and the recent decision in Goldacre (Offices) Limited v Nortel Networks UK Limited (in administration) will be welcomed by landlords everywhere.

In our work with international companies supplying goods to the UK, we see a number of common issues arising regularly. In our previous articles we looked at contractual payment protections for our clients. In this third of five articles based on the five elements of the Wu Xing, we take the theme of Water and explain what happens if a customer faces the fluid uncertainties of financial difficulties and descends into the winter of a formal insolvency process.

Water: understand what happens and your rights if your customer enters insolvency.

在与向英国供货的国际公司合作的过程中，我们发现了一些常见问题。前几篇文章探讨了供应商可采用的合同付款保护措施。在“五行”系列第三篇文章中，我们将以“水”元素为主题，阐释当客户面临财务困难带来的不确定性及正式破产程序的严冬时会出现什么情况。

水：了解在客户破产情况下的情势及此时供应商享有的权利

在我们提供法律服务的供应商中，其大多数客户都是英国有限公司。供应商的客户在遭遇财务困难后会根据英国法律进入破产程序。因此，对我们的国际客户而言，明白自己的客户破产对自己意味着什么，这非常重要。

客户进入管理程序，意味着有机会保持业务的持续经营。在此种情况下，客户公司受管理人控制，管理人的目标之一是满足公司债权人的要求。并不能保证所有债权人都能得到全额偿付，因为这主要取决于公司资产的价值。然而，部分债权人（如员工和税务机关——英国税务海关总署）会优先于无担保债权人受偿。如果在任何时候确定无法继续保持业务的持续经营，则管理程序可转为清算程序。许多管理程序以出售业务和资产告终，这可以通过一个“预打包”过程予以实现(即在任命管理人前安排出售，以促成这笔交易)。在此种情况下，债务仍由公司承担，从出售所得中偿还，但不可能对新的资产所有者进行追索。