Charles James Associates Group Ltd was wound up in the public interest on 4 May 2020 in the High Court before Judge Burton of the Insolvency and Companies Court. The Official Receiver has been appointed as liquidator.
In considering the petition, the court heard that Charles James Associates Group purchased companies that were sustainable and solvent, targeting small family operated businesses spread across the UK. Targets tended to be manufacturing companies or those that provided specialist services, including window manufacturing and sales, commercial vehicle repairs and book publishers.
Charles James Associates Group, however, didn't use any of its own funds or invest capital to acquire those businesses but used associated parties to arrange purchase agreements with the companies they intended to buy.
The associated parties would then negotiate it so that companies being bought would use their own money to complete the sale with the associated parties, as well as agreeing that any remaining balances would be paid on a deferred payment basis.
Charles James Associates Group would then purchase those businesses for a nominal sum from the associated parties before stripping the companies of their assets.
This would include diverting funds, using the purchased companies' funds to acquire assets for Charles James Associates Group, making payments to Charles James Associates Group directly and trading the companies to the detriment of their creditors and employees.
Additionally, Charles James Associates Group caused the companies they bought to not pay both their trade and Crown liabilities and in one case secured pension contributions from employees but failed to pay the money collected into the pension fund, which remains unaccounted for.
As a result of these activities, the acquired companies' finances deteriorated and they were placed into insolvency. The asset-stripping conducted by Charles James Associates Group also resulted in serious losses for creditors and employees lost their jobs.
Investigators from the Insolvency Service uncovered the misconduct through confidential enquiries and also found that Charles James Associates Group never had any formal presence at their registered address between September 2017 and April 2019, using the address without the permission of the property's occupants.
The company also traded using the website of the similarly-named connected predecessor company, Charles James Associates PLC, and used the same
