Busy schedule helps O’Hara & Co celebrate
A RECORD number of instructions is helping an independent Yorkshire corporate recovery and personal insolvency specialist mark its 20th anniversary.
Insolvency and corporate recovery practice, O’ Hara & Co, based in Birstall, West Yorkshire, has also appointed two new partners to strengthen its senior team and cope with the substantial increase in instructions during the last 12 months.
Senior partner, Peter O’Hara, who founded the business in Batley with five staff in 1989 after leaving the Leeds office of Coopers & Lybrand, said: “The practice has received more than 150 instructions during the last year – a record – and we expect this to double during the next 12 months due to the current economic conditions and have expanded our senior team accordingly.
“We would expect to be busy in the current climate but we judge ourselves on whether we have managed to achieve the fairest and best possible outcome for all concerned in every assignment we handle. Over the years we’ve saved numerous businesses and thousands of jobs.”
Mr O’Hara said he had received a number of invitations from bigger players to acquire O’Hara & Co but he said these had been dismissed.
“What is important for us is that we have achieved record instructions as a home-grown Yorkshire practice in a market increasingly occupied by large national firms,” he said.
The two new partners, both of whom have returned after time with national firms, are Christopher Brooksbank and Stephen O’Hara who join the senior team led by Simon Weir who joined the practice in 1992 and became a partner in 2003.
They are among nine recent appointments taking the total staff to 25.
The practice also has offices in York, Doncaster, Scarborough and Skegness, an associated debt collection company, Continental Cash Collection and recent acquisition, Fenton Finance, which provides funds for car buying.
“We’ve come across many reasons for businesses running into trouble including bad luck, bad debts and incompetent management but this recession is the first where businesses have given the reason as `no work’. ”
The practice is also holding a golf day this month which aims to raise a further £5,000 for the neo natal unit at Leeds General Infirmary for which Mr O’Hara has raised almost £75,000 in the last two years.
