Raising Official Receivers Deposit when on low income

[jojo1971]

hello all,

I'm a newbie and really hope somebody can advise me!

A year ago my brother and I were made redundant by our employer of over 14 years during a TUPE process (that clearly didn't go in our favour!) - we were not paid any redundancy or notice/holiday by our (original) employer and so went to an employment tribunal which went in our favour. The 'redundancy' element was paid to us via the Nat.Ins. fund but we can only claim the notice pay/holiday element if the co. is 'wound up'.

At the moment the co. is dormant and a request has been submitted for it to be struck off. We've contacted companies house and advised that there is an outstanding ET and they've agreed to not let the co. be struck off before 14/08/14.

So, the problem we have is that we don't have the £1165 required to petition the wind up of the company.

I think we can get remission on the £220 court costs through an EX160, but are we doomed to lose the money owed to us if we can't raise the £1165? My brother is on JSA and I work but am low income/lone parent.

Any advice much appreciated.

[FlamingParrot]

Re: Raising Official Receivers Deposit when on low income

hello all,

I'm a newbie and really hope somebody can advise me!

A year ago my brother and I were made redundant by our employer of over 14 years during a TUPE process (that clearly didn't go in our favour!) - we were not paid any redundancy or notice/holiday by our (original) employer and so went to an employment tribunal which went in our favour. The 'redundancy' element was paid to us via the Nat.Ins. fund but we can only claim the notice pay/holiday element if the co. is 'wound up'.

At the moment the co. is dormant and a request has been submitted for it to be struck off. We've contacted companies house and advised that there is an outstanding ET and they've agreed to not let the co. be struck off before 14/08/14.

So, the problem we have is that we don't have the £1165 required to petition the wind up of the company.

I think we can get remission on the £220 court costs through an EX160, but are we doomed to lose the money owed to us if we can't raise the £1165? My brother is on JSA and I work but am low income/lone parent.

Hi and welcome!

If a company is liquidated, the Insolvency Service has to pay any outstanding wages and holiday pay. The notice period is not so clear cut, as you only get it if you had no income whatsoever during that period. The Insolvency Service tells you to minimise your loss, for example, by claiming JSA. As far as I know, notice periods are calculated on the basis of a week per year of service and are capped at 12 weeks.

There are charities and organisations that can help people raise the money to petition their own bankruptcy, but not to petition other's, including winding up companies.

[jojo1971]

Re: Raising Official Receivers Deposit when on low income

Hi Flaming Parrot... thanks for the excellent advice... do you have any idea of the time frame of getting the money from the NI fund once we've gone to court and wound up the company... might be worth a short term loan for the payback involved (there are actually x4 of us that were wrongly dismissed and all went to tribunal at same time - the other two are retired and just happy to split x4 ways anything we recover)... thanks again

[FlamingParrot]

Re: Raising Official Receivers Deposit when on low income

Hi Flaming Parrot... thanks for the excellent advice... do you have any idea of the time frame of getting the money from the NI fund once we've gone to court and wound up the company... might be worth a short term loan for the payback involved (there are actually x4 of us that were wrongly dismissed and all went to tribunal at same time - the other two are retired and just happy to split x4 ways anything we recover)... thanks again

When involved in a similar situation (company liquidated), the Insolvency Service paid up in around 6 weeks on average. Various payments were claimed and, although the claims were submitted at the same time (all on the same form), payments were made separately at different times, i.e. redundancies were paid first, overtime/holiday pay/wages a bit later, notice period later still. The times have a lot to do with the liquidators and how quickly they process/pass on the information to the IS. The idea is that the liquidators should ensure there are no funds available in the company to make those payments before passing them on to the IS, as normally employees would have priority as creditors if there were any funds.

As it's quite a few of you, it may well be worth your while to try, not that I would want to recommend most short-term loan providers.