Defeat hung in the air at the end of the creditors' meeting for the failed Maclean Computing Limited (MCL) yesterday. Damien Grant, liquidator at Waterstone Insolvency, told the room of around 20, mostly unsecured creditors that they were unlikely to recover any money from MCL.
MCL was put into liquidation last month and its assets bought by Maclean Technology Limited (MTL).
Suppliers, vendors, partners, some staff and other unsecured creditors are owed $953,000.
Grant said $419,000 owed to MCL staff will be paid in full by the end of the week, and already 80 percent has been paid out. There is an $18,000 cap on staff payments, anything owed beyond this Grant said will be considered unsecured. The amount owed to staff in this situation is $40,000.
Grant told the meeting that all but three unnamed Maclean staff members have been paid so far.
He said some staff appeared to have used the company’s customer database for business activities outside of Maclean Computing.
Grant would not give details, but said: “Those activities are causing the liquidation an economic loss.” He said he will seek further legal advice on the matter.
During the meeting there were two filed motions - one to create a creditors' committee to oversee further actions taken by Waterstone and another to replace the liquidator entirely.
Although the majority of creditors who attended voted to pass both motions, they were defeated because a staff member Claire Arkell, who was at the meeting and was representing 28 Maclean staff, denied the motions by proxy. Arkell is listed as the financial controller at Maclean Technology Ltd on the company’s website.
Maclean staff have told Computerworld there were several occasions where management had sent them official statements before public announcements made by Grant, including the announcements of the liquidation and sale.
During the meeting Grant denied having knowledge of this, and the staff present confirmed the messages were not from him.
Grant also confirmed he will investigate whether MCL can claw back around $700,000 of payments made to unsecured creditors in the 24 months prior to MCL’s liquidation. Grant would not name the specific companies involved, but a source close to the matter has toldComputerworld that Waterstone will attempt to retrieve $200,000 from Westcon Group.
Read the rest of this article on Computerworld.