M&S failure hits hauliers
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• Hauliers face bills of more ilan £100,000 following the collapse of Buxton-based clearing house M&S Transport. The company went into liquidation last week owing £102,483 to 130 creditors after its remaining assets of £.25,470 had been realised. It had been trading for just over a year.
The company, named after its two shareholders, Michael and Shirley Hazlewood, blamed the collapse on the withdrawal of a major customer and a week-long power failure this summer.
Michael Hazlewood was a director of DMP Transport, which has been in Liquidation since October 1990 — the month in which M&S was launched.
An M&S creditors' meeting was held in Manchester last week at the offices of receiver Kidson Impey where Geoffrey Hilton was appointed liquidator. A creditors' committee comprising representatives of BRS Northern, Aliens Transport and Cork Gully will begin investigating the company's affairs.
The creditors' committee will try to establish if M&S continued to trade while insolvent. Hazlewood stresses that two companies had shown an interest in buying M&S before it collapsed, and he claims that up to four contracts were in the pipeline.
At the creditors' meeting a representative of BRS Northern told Hazlewood: "Your creditors were financing your contracts and you treated them badly."
"I can't argue with that," replied Hazlewood.
Hilton told creditors that if it was proved that M&S had continued to trade while insolvent its directors could be held personally liable for some of the company's debts. Hazlewood said he was now on the dole and could not even afford his mortgage repayments.
The failure of M&S follows the much larger crash of freight forwarder Eezee Euro which owes hauliers more than £420,000 (CM 31 Oct-6 Nov). Both firms list Transworld Distribution among their creditors, although Transworld ceased trading in May owing more than £1m to 1,000 companies. Hazlewood claims he refused to pay Transworld a debt of £6,592 because it failed to provide delivery notes.
M&S creditors include R&B Freight Services of Warrington. Transport manager Clifford Hall says the company is owed £1,768 for work between July and September and that his firm never received any payment from M&S.
Stockport owner-driver Mark Bresnahan, who began working for the company in January, is owed £1,864.