Directors of ticket company that owed council £600k+ disqualified for 10 years

Two directors of a ticketing company that failed to hand over more than £600,000 owed to Cambridge City Council have each been banned from acting as company directors for ten years.

The company, Secureticket (UK) Limited, sold tickets online for the Cambridge Folk Festival in 2007 and 2008. Its contract with the local authority specified that any funds received should be held in a protected client account.

However, the company failed to meet these obligations. Sums in excess of £100,000 were instead transferred to its general business account, and subsequently to the directors or to companies connected to them.

Secureticket (UK) Limited went into voluntary liquidation in January 2009, owing more than £4.5m to creditors.

The city council was forced earlier this year to write off the whole of the £618,000 it was owed.

An investigation was launched by Company Investigations (South) at the Insolvency Service.

Mohammed Rashid Qajar, 47, and Sally Oakley, 49, who both came from Winchester, directors of Secureticket, had been due to defend themselves at a five-day hearing last month.

However, shortly before the hearing was due to begin, they offered undertakings. These mean they are prohibited from acting as directors of a limited company for ten years, from 13 December 2012.

Cambridge City Council’s head of legal services, Simon Pugh, had been due to give evidence at the trial before the case was withdrawn.

Rod Cantrill, the local authority’s Executive Councillor for Arts, Sport and Public Places, said: "We very much welcome the outcome of the case, which is a further indication of the shameful way that SecureTicket (UK) Ltd and its directors behaved towards Cambridge City Council and its residents. 



“The disqualification sends out a strong message and offers protection to the public against the business activities of these directors for a long time. Obviously this does not mean we will get the money back but we will continue to use all practicable measures to seek repayment of our money for the residents of Cambridge.” 



Mark Bruce, a Chief Examiner at The Insolvency Service, said:
“Many of the directors we investigate have usually caused material financial harm to the company’s creditors but this case is especially grave because the damage will have reverberated through a community.


“People living in the Cambridge area will have suffered indirectly from a reduction in funds available to the council for the crucial community services it provides. These services are relied upon by some of the most vulnerable in our society.”

Bruce added that the ten-year disqualifications “should serve as a reminder to all company directors of the potential consequences of failing to maintain proper professional standards.”