Silks Solicitors Limited (07741964): administration
- Status
- Administration ended
- Administration began
- 2024-02-29
- Administrators' firm
- Opus Restructuring
- Incorporated
- 2011-08-16
- Location
- Milton Keynes
- Industry
- 69102 Solicitors
Why it went into administration
- Regulatory change or action
- COVID-19
- Cash flow / liquidity pressure
From the administrators' statement
As shown above, at year end 30 September 2022 the accounts showed the Company having made a loss. The Directors state that was attributable to the impact of COVID-19, the reduced rates of stamp duty land tax that ended in 2021 and took effect by the 2022 accounting period, resulting in a loss and ended the ‘conveyancing bubble’ which had generated an increase in the 2021 year end accounts. The Directors have also stated that the conveyancing bubble masked an underlying reduction of work in the practise as a whole.
The Company also suffered an increase in overheads, where professional indemnity insurance, which cost £88,256 in 2020, but in 2022 the cost had increased by 238% to £210,211, which eradicated any profitability at a time the practise turnover decreased also.
In addition, the nature of Personal Injury work drastically changed when the Personal Injury Reforms Act was enacted on 31 May 2021, which resulted in a change to the existing law concerning road traffic accidents (“RTA”). In summary this reduced compensation awards as a while, by abolishing the ability to recover legal costs in the majority of RTA’s. This also had an impact on turnover as it also slowed the recovery of costs from insurers.
Administrators' statement of proposals (2024-04-06) · Companies House register