Director banned for six years

THE Manchester-based director of a hairdressing business that failed in 2010 has been disqualified for six years for failing to disclose company assets to the administrator.

Harry Miller was a director of Franja which had a chain of salons across the UK but went into administration owing creditors £813,000.

An investigation by The Insolvency Service’s Company Investigations team in Manchester found Mr Miller and a relative were each paid £34,500 in consultancy fees when he bought Franja but no evidence of this work was ever produced.

The service said that shortly before the administration in July 2010 he instructed the company’s accountants to credit car mileage claims of £15,600 each for himself and a relative to his director’s loan account, but no mileage records have ever been produced.

He also failed to disclose to the administrator all the assets of Franja, including fixtures and fittings, in premises in Rochdale, Bradford, Altrincham, Birmingham, Llanelli and Stirling.

Claire Entwistle, director of Company Investigations North, said: “The public should be assured that in these tough economic times, directors of insolvent companies who seek to benefit themselves ahead of creditors will be pursued rigorously by The Insolvency Service.

“An aggravating feature of this case was that Mr Miller failed to disclose all the company’s assets to the administrator. This disqualification prevents him from carrying on any business except at his own risk.”