Break-up of Wenham Major nears completion

Tony Stockdale, managing partner at Bentley Jennison

Administrators of crisis-stricken Top 50 firm Wenham Major have now almost completed the sale of units that still hold value.

This week it emerged that the firm’s insolvency practice is set to go to senior manager Kiran Mistry. The end of last week saw RSM Bentley Jennison acquire Wenham Major’s core accounting and audit business.

Tony Stockdale, managing partner at Bentley Jennison, said: ‘The core business is a strong business. Whatever happened was a matter for the other parts of the business.’

Stockdale was spending this week talking to Wenham clients and preparing around 30 staff to relocate to Birmingham. Jennison made the acquisition out of existing reserves but the value of the deal was not disclosed. Accounting and audit was turning over around £2m annually.

The sell-off comes after Wenham Major entered administration on Wednesday of last week following a statement that ‘financial irregularities’ had been uncovered by the firm’s joint owner Ammar Azam in the separate private client business.

A statement from parent body Wenham Major Global Capital Partners said legal action was being pursued against joint owner and Wenham Major Private Client founder John Joyce. He is in hospital and unavailable for comment.

Wenham Major caught the attention of the accounting world after growing to a turnover of £22.5m and the number 23 spot in the 2007 Accountancy Age Top 50. It is the largest failure of an accountancy
firm since Andersen in 2002.

The sale to Jennison came late on Friday after a week in which administrators from Vantis discussed a deal with several interested parties.

Vantis staff will now turn their attention to recovering creditors’ funds and uncovering the events that brought about the firm’s demise.

Nick O’Reilly, the administrator in charge, said: ‘We have been concentrating on saving employees, looking after the interests of creditors and minimising disruption to the clients. Stage two will now start to work out what happened.'

In all six entities relating to Wenham Major entered administration with Vantis: Wenham Major Global Capital Partners LLP and Cornwall Street Property LLP, Wenham Major Ltd, Wenham Major Private Client and two non-trading companies Abbey Specialised Solutions and Wenham Major Business Services.