encompass case study | Turpin Barker Armstrong© Encompass Corporation 2016

encompass case study | Turpin Barker Armstrong

Yet that year, when John Crickmere rode 5/1

favourite Discount to victory and Fuller Pilch

accumulated a total of 517 runs at an average

of 17.82, was long ago. In this year children

as young as four years old were put to work

in mines, mills and factories, they and their

mothers offered little protection in law.

When, in 1844, Charles Dickens published

The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit,

Victoria had been Queen for nearly a decade.

The author was a favourite of the monarch’s

– she had been absorbed by Oliver Twist

and Pickwick Papers, works that illustrated

the distress of the country’s poor, everyday

struggles of its disadvantaged and the gross

unfairness visited on those entangled in an

opaque legal system, as depicted by the

incarceration in debtors’ prison of the kindly

Samuel Pickwick. Twenty years earlier, Dickens

had endured great personal suffering when

his father, unable to repay the forty pounds

and ten shillings he owed a baker, was

incarcerated in Marshalsea prison along with

his mother and his four youngest siblings.

This event forced twelve-year-old Charles to

leave school for the misery of making shoe

polish in a factory warehouse. For society

to be reformed, law makers had to act.

The economy, too, was in need of reform.

Businesses operated either as groups

established by Royal Charter, for example

those found to exploit overseas lands

such as the British East India and Hudson’s

Bay Companies, by interests established

by Private Act, such as those used to

create the country’s network of canals, as

unincorporated associations, or as sole traders.

This was a time of great technical innovation

and a richness of raw materials, many sourced

from overseas colonies. Yet, the economy

lacked the agility to take best advantage.

Most individuals had neither the funds nor

the privilege to secure royal charter or private

act. Existing businesses could be groups

of thousands or members making recourse

or litigation so difficult to be impossible.

The year 1844 offered an auspicious time for

change. This sentiment was acknowledged by

many in the House of Commons where Robert

Peel was serving his second term as Prime

Minister. In this year, parliament passed laws

that protected the vulnerable from exploitation

and the unfortunate from excesses of a heavy-

handed judicial system, and imposed sanction

on the predatory and dishonest while providing

mechanism for creditors to recover unpaid debt.

A settled Queen on the throne; the favourite horse wins the Grand National; the player acknowledged as cricket’s best batsman leads the season’s averages. So familiar that it could have been any year of the recent past.

EMBRACING DIGITISED SEARCH AT TURPIN BARKER ARMSTRONG

encompass case study | Turpin Barker Armstrong

The Factory Act gave new protections to

women and children by limiting their working

hours. The Insolvency Act gave protection to

private persons by abolishing imprisonment for

those with debts less than £20, and allowing

them to become bankrupt, an option previously

reserved for traders. The Joint Stock Companies

Act created the possibility for individuals to

incorporate as a single entity recognised in law

by registering with the new Registrar of Joint

Stock Companies. The office of Registrar exists

to this day, its current incumbent being Tim

Moss, CBE at Companies House. In the same

year, the Joint Stock Companies Winding-Up

Act recognised the need for regulations on

how a company could be made bankrupt and

its creditors returned money owed to them.

Subsequent legislation has built on

these foundations, and the Insolvency

Act of 1986 gave rise to licensing of

Insolvency Practitioners, professionals

who specialise in working with financially

troubled companies (and individuals) to

achieve recovery or formal insolvency.

Based in Surrey, Turpin Barker Armstrong’s

Corporate Recovery and Insolvency division

comprises three appointment taking partners

and 12 insolvency staff. In this case study,

Ryan Russell, Insolvency Manager at the firm,

discusses how software designed for their

profession helps them respond quickly to win

business, to find assets, to return value to

creditors, and scrutinise director misconduct.

Situated in Surrey and serving clients throughout London and the South East,Turpin Barker Armstrong have been operating for over 30 years. Their client bases includes everyone

from sole proprietors to groups of companies.

Their eight partners and over forty other team members have specialist knowledge in business services, corporate recovery and insolvency, and advising financial services.

For further information and contact details, visit turpinba.co.uk

ABOUTTURPIN BARKER ARMSTRONG

Through its Insolvency Service, Companies

House, Serious Fraud Office and HM

Revenue and Customs, the Government

provides means to report fraud, serious

misconduct, and tax evasion by limited

companies or their directors. The Government

will frequently employ the services of

Insolvency Practitioners and their teams of

professionals to investigate such cases.

“Referrals from HM Revenue and Customs to

investigate directors exhibiting unfit behaviour

are a source of work for Turpin Barker

Armstrong”, explains Ryan. “We must quickly

communicate our decision on whether we

accept the case to HMRC, and this requires

that we understand the asset position of

potential litigation targets which would result

in sufficient recoveries to cover the costs and

expenses of administering the insolvency

in addition to providing a return to creditors

where possible. Logging onto the websites of

Companies House and the Land Registry to

download reports, to read them thoroughly

and to find and extract the relevant facts is a

time-consuming and error-prone activity”.

Turpin Barker Armstrong have found a more

effective approach to this background

research. Ryan reports “With Encompass

Uncover for Restructuring & Insolvency, we

can quickly undertake searches at Companies

House, Land Registry and other sources to

find property and other assets and establish

the likely worth of the individual and what

money may be available for recovery.

Automating what used to be a manual

process means we respond faster and with

greater confidence to requests from HMRC”

RESPONDING AT SPEEDAND WITH CONFIDENCE TO HMRC

with encompass uncover , we can quickly undertake searches at

companies house , land registry and other sources to find property

and other assets.. . automating what used to be a manual process means we respond faster and with greater confidence to requests from hmrc .

encompass case study | Turpin Barker Armstrongencompass case study | Turpin Barker Armstrong

by usingencompass uncover ,

[we] quickly get a feel for the client’s financial situation.. .

[ it ’s] simple and fast, and stores all the

relevant information in a single place.

TRACING MONEY OWED TO CREDITORSIn England and Wales, ORs (official receivers)

from the Insolvency Service manage early

stages of the winding-up of companies by a

court. ORs are responsible for collecting assets

of insolvent companies and they frequently

appoint an insolvency practitioner to undertake

this work. To ensure a fair distribution of work,

ORs maintain a rota and firms interested in

taking these cases can register their interest

and take their turn to be offered work. In

cases where a company being wound-up

is insolvent and there has been wrongful

trading (or antecedent transactions), directors

can be made personally liable for debts,

and in such situations it is the responsibility

of insolvency professionals to trace assets

such as houses, boats and luxury cars.

“Turpin Barker Armstrong was recently offered

a bankruptcy case from the Official Receiver;

when we read the documents attached to

the case we didn’t see mention of any assets

of value”, recalls Ryan. “Whilst firms accept

their civic duty to support the work of the OR,

the risk of taking such cases is that our firm

spends more money investigating the bankrupt

and reporting than we can recover to pay the

costs and expenses of the insolvency and

provide a return to creditors. In this situation,

we investigated the individual using Encompass

Uncover and quickly found an additional

property belonging to the bankrupt that was

not included in documents originally passed

to us by the Official Receiver. The recoverable

value available in the property improved

the prospects of a return to creditors.”

“Because of that experience, now whenever

we are offered a case by the Official Receiver,

we always run a series of searches with

Encompass Uncover to build a picture of

the director/bankrupt. Doing this before our

first face-to-face meeting means should

the individual fail to disclose information

about properties and assets when asked

we know from their response whether

we are dealing with a person prone to

dishonesty, and we can plan accordingly.”.

Turpin Barker Armstrong’s experience is

that the sooner directors of companies

displaying early signs of financial difficulty

seek professional advice, the better

their chances of avoiding failure. To

encourage directors finding themselves

in difficulty, the firm offer a no obligation

first meeting completely free of charge.

“Our firm does a fair amount of informal work

for prospective clients to protect them from

becoming insolvent,” relates Ryan. “Before

a first meeting we use Encompass Uncover

to undertake research at Companies House.

This may involve searches on the company

and follow-on searches of its directors. It

can be particularly valuable to understand

any charges against a company and the

ownership structure. By using Encompass

Uncover, professionals in our firm quickly get

an early feel for the client’s financial situation.

Encompass Uncover makes this very simple

and fast, and also stores all the relevant

information in a single place. Then, should

the prospect become a client, we digitally

stream all that information directly into our case

management system, Turnkey IPS, to establish

the informational foundation of the case.”

ADVISE EARLY; PROMOTE RECOVERY

ABOUT ENCOMPASS UNCOVERLeading firms rely on Encompass Uncover to accelerate and enhance search at each stage of a case.

It empowers them to:

• Minimise risk and error with automation

• Visualise complex corporate structures

• Demonstrate compliance with ease

• Streamline processes to reduce un-billable work

Request your demo at:encompasscorporation.com/request-a-demo

The regulatory framework created in

1844 marks an important milestone in the

development of the UK’s vibrant economy.

The Joint Stock Companies Act was followed

in 1855 by the Limited Liability Act, allowing

investors in a company to limit their liability

to their amount invested. This maturing

regulatory framework has given impetus to

the development of a network of professional

specialists offering advice and services to

those looking to start and grow companies.

Today, directors can turn for advice to an array

of professionals including lawyers, accountants,

bankers, asset-based lenders, and insolvency

practitioners. Information about a client of value

to one service provider is often equally valuable

to another, and the increasing digitisation of

the economy is creating new opportunities

for specialists from different professions

to share information and to collaborate

and deliver cohesive services to clients.

Corporate recovery and insolvency

professionals at Turpin Barker Armstrong are

riding the digital wave. “Particularly in cases

where a client is considering litigation,” recounts

Ryan. “Investigating large cases involving

complex corporate structures can be very

time consuming. Using Encompass Uncover

we can quickly build a chart which highlights

links between companies, subsidiaries and

individuals, allowing our team to develop

their understanding of complex ownership

structures and to identify the ultimate

beneficial owner(s). We can easily download all

documents relative to a case and share these

with a solicitor so they and the client benefit

from our work of developing a comprehensive

perspective of complex matters.”

We can trace the work of insolvency

practitioners and their teams on a trajectory

that originates with Acts of Parliament passed

in 1844. Those and subsequent laws equip the

national economy with the means to innovate

and grow that serve as standards guiding

regulation in countries across the world.

An important counterpart of this framework

is protection for creditors who make loans,

and supply products and services to private

companies. Insolvency Practitioners fulfil

the important role in a modern economy by

working alongside Government agencies to

provide advice and services that help troubled

companies to restructure and survive, to close

down companies not fit to operate, and to

investigate unfit conduct by individual directors.

The digital economy and tools such as

Encompass Uncover present opportunities

for insolvency professionals to work in new

efficient and effective ways that benefit their

clients, their peers in neighbouring professions,

and agencies of Government responsible for

steering the course of the national economy.

WORKING DIGITALLYBENEFITS ALL PARTIES using encompass we can quickly build a chart which

highlights links between companies, subsidiaries and individuals, allowing our team to develop their

understanding of complex ownership structures and to identify the ultimate beneficial owner(s).

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