Business Debt Recovery

Newtons Solicitors provide debt recovery advice and assistance for commercial organisations and individuals.

Business debt recovery can be extremely stressful for a business, no matter the size of the business or the industry in which it operates. At Newtons, our specialist commercial debt recovery solicitors provide expert debt recovery advice and assistance for commercial organisations and individuals. We work speedily and thoroughly to ensure your debt is recovered in a fast, accurate and cost-effective manner.

What is Business Debt?

Business debt, or commercial debt, is debt that is owed to a business. It’s not abnormal for businesses to owe debt, especially start-ups, but if a business is struggling or unwilling to repay debt to you, serious problems can arise.

There are many reasons as to why a business or individual may not have repaid you. For example, they may dispute the amount owed, be unsatisfied with the work provided, be struggling with funds or have entered into insolvency.

What is Business Debt Recovery?

Business debt recovery is where a business attempts to recover debts owed to them by another business or individual.

Why is the Commercial Debt Recovery Process Important?

Debt can have a crippling impact on cash flow with the additional time and effort in chasing payment eroding any remaining profit from the settlement. What’s more, outstanding debts can seriously harm your business’ reputation if it means you are unable to pay your staff and creditors. Therefore, it’s vital to begin the commercial debt recovery process as soon as possible.

Is There a Time Limit on Beginning the Commercial Debt Recovery Process?

According to the Limitation Act 1980, you can chase an unsecured debt for up to six years from when you were last in contact with the debtor or last received a payment from them. If you are chasing a secured debt, you have up to 12 years.

Expert Corporate Debt Recovery Service

Our expert corporate debt recovery service includes:

• Provision of pre-action advice and collection
  The first stage of the business debt recovery process involves pre-action. Usually, this involves sending a formal letter to the debtor to request the debt repayment. At this stage, we would attempt to conclude the matter and avoid going to court.
• Court proceedings
  If the business debt recovery is not concluded during the pre-action negotiations, we would provide advice on County Court proceedings and seek a County Court Judgement (CCJ).
• Enforcement action
  If the County Court awards a CCJ and the debtor still doesn’t pay, we would advise on enforcement action.
• Bankruptcy
  If the debtor is insolvent, and therefore cannot repay debts, we would advise on bankruptcy proceedings or winding up petitions.
• Liquidation:
  If the debtor has liquidated their assets, we would advise on corporate debt recovery and what to do if the sale of assets is not enough to cover the debt owed.

Specialist Commercial Debt Recovery Solicitors

We offer a commercial debt recovery process that is tailored to you and your business needs. We take a one-to-one approach with each of our clients to ensure we advise on the best recovery methods for you.

The sooner the business debt recovery process begins, the better the chance of a successful outcome. Our highly experienced commercial debt recovery solicitors regularly achieve excellent results for clients across the business and individual spectrum.

Costs

Our charges are based upon the amount of time we spend on your behalf.  Our hourly rates are as follows;

Senior Solicitors:              £250 per hour plus VAT;
Solicitors:                          £230 per hour plus VAT; and
Paralegals:                         £150 per hour plus VAT.

The likely overall cost of your matter depends upon the amount of work that is required. This will depend upon how your opponent responds.  Estimated costs where matters get to the point of issuing court proceedings will be in the region of £3,000 – £5,000 plus VAT. 

If the case is not resolved and we have to prepare for trial, then the cost of your case is likely to be considerably higher.  If we end up going to trial then your case is likely to cost between £10,000 and £15,000 plus VAT.  Again, this does depend upon the amount of work that is required.

We may need to amend these estimates as your case progresses, but we will keep you regularly updated on the question of costs.  If you decide not to proceed with your matter, and we have given an estimate of costs, we will calculate our bill according to the time we have spent on it using the hourly rates set out above, but that charge will not exceed our estimate of costs.

During the course of your case we may need to make payments to other parties, for example court fees;  expert witnesses or barristers.  We will discuss this with you in advance and advise on the likely costs where this is necessary.

The costs information provided above is intended to provide a rough guide on likely costs, we would always recommend you contact us in person to discuss your matter and we will be able to provide you with a bespoke cost estimate.