Laura WilesThe Insolvency Service has confirmed that two business partners have been disqualified from acting as directors after allowing £13.9m to pass through two companies using unauthorised bank overdrafts.
Scott Dylan – who received £1.65m – and David Antrobus have been banned from acting as directors for 13 and 10 years respectively.
Between July and September 2021, the pair allowed monies to be transferred to one of their accounts (including in the name of Oldcoft Ltd, Old3 Ltd and a euro account for Oldcoft Ltd) from 10 connected companies, and during the same period, more than £11.7m payments were made from the account to Dylan, another related account, and other connected companies. Oldcoft’s liquidators were unable to find any evidence to support Dylan’s claim that the money was used to purchase a hotel in Turkey.
Barclays secured freezing orders on the accounts in late September 2021, and after enquiring why and where the transfers had been made, demanded repayment. However, the 10 connected companies entered provisional liquidation in November 2021. Similarly, Oldcoft was wound up in January 2022 owing around £44m and Old3 Ltd entered administration in April, with creditors owed around £8.2m. Dylan and Antrobus breaches Barclays’ freezing order by transferring an entire group of companies to two companies in the BVI.
The pair have each been sentenced to imprisonment for breaching court orders and, and their disqualifications come into effect on 25 December 2025.