Help with Ex wifes car under HP and Company in liquidation

kol1965

Hi All,

Quick question. My Company went into liquidation a few months back.
We had 3 vehicles on finance as follows:

A) My Ex. Wifes Car which was on HP. She paid the Company the money to clear this HP, we used the money to prop up the Company's bank account and continued to pay the HP. Over 50% of the total has being paid up.

A staff member wanted to buy a Commercial jeep and asked us to reclaim the VAT for him. We leased the Jeep and within 6 months he came into money and paid us for the total amount Excl. the VAT.
Again, we used the money to prop up the Company.

C) My own jeep.

The finance Company now want the vehicles back. But the two individuals both paid the Company in full for them. (They weren't aware that there were being financed).
I want to try and help both individuals to keep the assets.
Both Vehicles licensing certs are in the individuals own names.
I Don't have the money to clear the Finance (Approx €15k & 18K outstanding).
I had a Jeep myself on finance, which I am currently trying to sell on behalf of the Finance Company)

Any suggestions as to how I can help the two individuals.
I am still on talking terms with the Ex and the former staff member and would hope to keep it that way.

Thanks a Mill

keithclancy

kol1965 wrote: »

Hi All,

Quick question. My Company went into liquidation a few months back.
We had 3 vehicles on finance as follows:

A) My Ex. Wifes Car which was on HP. She paid the Company the money to clear this HP, we used the money to prop up the Company's bank account and continued to pay the HP. Over 50% of the total has being paid up.

A staff member wanted to buy a Commercial jeep and asked us to reclaim the VAT for him. We leased the Jeep and within 6 months he came into money and paid us for the total amount Excl. the VAT.
Again, we used the money to prop up the Company.

C) My own jeep.

The finance Company now want the vehicles back. But the two individuals both paid the Company in full for them. (They weren't aware that there were being financed).
I want to try and help both individuals to keep the assets.
Both Vehicles licensing certs are in the individuals own names.
I Don't have the money to clear the Finance (Approx €15k & 18K outstanding).
I had a Jeep myself on finance, which I am currently trying to sell on behalf of the Finance Company)

Any suggestions as to how I can help the two individuals.
I am still on talking terms with the Ex and the former staff member and would hope to keep it that way.

Thanks a Mill

A. You don't own the Vehicles, the finance company does.
B. They'll take the vehicles back once they don't get paid
C. Either you give them their money back or pay the outstanding amount, essentially you've taken their money and used it for a purpose other than purchasing the vehicles.

jor el

The people who bought the vehicles shouldn't have bought them when there was finance still outstanding on them. The finance company can legally reposes them, and probably will. The buyers have no rights here.

dudara

Moved to Motors - I think that's where you'll get the best advice.

Essentially, your employees believed that the cars were theirs once they paid you the money, whereas the cars always belong to the Finance company. You misused the funds from your employees rather than clearing the debt.

I think you should seek legal advice immediately.

Stevie Dakota

When you say they were "not aware that the cars where financed", do you mean "I didn't tell them." I assume you are still on talking terms with them as you have not told them they are €33K down due to your actions?

mickdw

You have major issues here & im afraid you wont be able to hide under your bust company with this one, The issue relate to the manner in which you handled the company finances which to me appears to be completely illegal. You cannot have a wife driving around in a company car when not connected to the company. The tax benefits gained in this way is company fraud.
The employee who you rented a jeep for, OK he is an employee with a company jeep however when he went to buy it from the company, the company would have to charge him VAT on its value at that time. You have therefore given the jeep to the guy too cheaply if you had actually cleared it off. As it stands, he has been conned, & even if you gathered the funds to clear it, you would be short changing the company as vat portion would have to go to tax man. Again this means cash was fraudulently removed from the company.

squod

Are ou saying the previous employee has no receipt for the vehicle? Is he the registered owner? Has he any contract with the HP company?

robtri

a couple of words jump to mind Fraud and jail-time

shamwari

I think you are going to find yourself in a shed-load of trouble here.

You have taken their money on the premise that you would discharge their liabilities for them. Not only have you failed to do this, but you have used the money for your own purposes, and you have left these people running the real risk of loosing goods they believe are theirs, and also out of pocket to boot.

Why on earth did you not refer your ex-wife and your employee directly to the finance company and let them deal directly with these companies?

I might be wrong here, but at best you are guilty of gross dishonesty, and at worst, you have committed theft and / or fraud.

Do the decent thing and fess up.....:mad:

goat2

the person you helped get the vat back on the vehicle for, and then he gave you the remainder outstanding money to pay off the debt, and instead you went and put it in the company instead, he is the one you should really look after first, as he is not family, and he had paid every last penny on that vehicle, or so he thought, he trusted you with his money,

Fishtits

shamwari wrote: »

I think you are going to find yourself in a shed-load of trouble here.

Regardless, you bought more than you could repay.

Face the music, prep for NAMA.

The sooner this country is governed by grown ups the better...

kol1965

Oh God, Thanks for sugar coating it!!!!
I know I've done wrong here and am willing to face up to my responsibilities.
I did not do this with intentions of defrauding them.

They both wanted to finance the vehicles for their own reasons day one.

On reviewing my first post I said that they didn't know that the vehicles were financed. They did know, but they thought that the finance was been cleared when they paid the balance off.
I assumed that I would be able to trade the Company out of difficulty and pay off the finance.
I lodged the money into the Company current account basically to keep the Company afloat and keep everyone in jobs, keep maintaining my ex. wife and keep myself in a job. I did not use that money personally. I am not trying to hide behind the liquidator.
However, I have lost everything, including a shed load of personal money that I put into the Company to keep it afloat.
I Know that I should have cleared any O/S finance when I got the money, but desperate measures kicked in!
I am trying to make this right if at all possible. There is no point in saying that I should pay the loans off now. I do not have the money. My own home is going to be Repossessed in the near future. I am bankrupt.
If anyone else wants to take shots, please do. But, I am trying to find out if there's anyway I can help these people.
I don't want sympanthy off anyone, but would appreciate pragmatic suggestions as to how I can help these people retain their assets.

johnos1984

In simple terms SEEK LEGAL ADVICE NOW.

This forum is not appropriate for what you need

the_syco

A) Seek legal advice

The two people who bought a car and a jeep through you did so to avoid tax. By them doing this, it's fraud. By you doing this on their behalf, you committed the fraud. I'd wonder what their legal position would be if they tried to sue you, as unless they were part of the company, I doubt they should have gotten the car and jeep.

dudara

kol1965 wrote: »

I don't want sympanthy off anyone, but would appreciate pragmatic suggestions as to how I can help these people retain their assets.

The simple fact is that those vehicles are not those people's assets - they are the assets of the finance company and remain so until the debt is repaid.

TBH - and I mean this kindly - I don't think there is anything you can do to help these people - unless you can clear the outstanding finance.

hinault

Agree with all of the previous posters who explained that the finance company own these cars.

Unless you stump up the money to repay in total the amounts outstanding, those cars will be going back to the finance company because you have defaulted.
In addition any recovery costs, will also be charged to you also.

I also think that any judge granting the order to repossess would not be impressed if he became aware of any side deals that you had entered in to regarding property (the cars).
You do not have title on those properties to enter such deals with your ex-wife and former employee.

ANXIOUS

Is their not a rule that the car can not be repod if you've made 50% plus one of the payments? Maybe the op has enough money to bring it over this mark.

hinault

ANXIOUS wrote: »

Is their not a rule that the car can not be repod if you've made 50% plus one of the payments? Maybe the op has enough money to bring it over this mark.

Transfer of title/ownership does not occur until all repayments outstanding have been paid by the leassee.

The property belongs to the lessor until full repayments have been received.
The number of repayments made would not have any bearing on a repossession order.
Higher purchase agreements are explicit.

ANXIOUS

hinault wrote: »

Transfer of title/ownership does not occur until all repayments outstanding have been paid by the leassee.

The property belongs to the lessor until full repayments have been received.
The number of repayments made would not have any bearing on a repossession order.
Higher purchase agreements are explicit.

Yeah I realized that about the transfer of title, I thought that it would just give the op more time.

If I was advising the op I'd tell him to cone clean and get good leagal representation.

If I was advising the ex wife and worker I'd tell them to report it to the gardai asap.

Sponge Bob

Even messier, the entity that took out the contract with the finance company ...the original company...no longer exists. There is no contract between the finance company and the OP in his own right.

The wheels normally belong to the finance company save that the employees were allowed to transfer them to their own names which is strange, normally this is impossible. Get legal advice and bring all the contracts with you.

L-M

I would reply with something worthwhile but it'd be pointless.

I hope things work out for you in the near future, but I can't condone what you've done. Two honest people will be without their jeep and hard earned cash because of it.

Not a nice place to be, and posting it on a public forum isn't going to help at all.

Legal advice is needed here, but I can't see anything coming of it.

kildare.17hmr

kol1965 just want to wish you luck, hope things work out ok

goat2

the_syco wrote: »

A) Seek legal advice

The two people who bought a car and a jeep through you did so to avoid tax. By them doing this, it's fraud. By you doing this on their behalf, you committed the fraud. I'd wonder what their legal position would be if they tried to sue you, as unless they were part of the company, I doubt they should have gotten the car and jeep.

i agree very with this poster, there was a fraud committed on day one and i guess they will learn that c---- does not pay,,,,,, ypee

Pkiernan

If you are a director of your company, you would do well to talk to a solicitor.

You may well be charged with fraud or theft if the people involved report you to the police. As a director you can be held criminally responsible.

My advice would be to scrape together whatever money you can and pay off the monies owed on the vehicles.

bazzachazza

Pkiernan wrote: »

If you are a director of your company, you would do well to talk to a solicitor.

You may well be charged with fraud or theft if the people involved report you to the police. As a director you can be held criminally responsible.

My advice would be to scrape together whatever money you can and pay off the monies owed on the vehicles.

I somehow doubt he has €33000 lying around otherwise he would not be BANKRUPT and having his home repossessed.

What you did was very very foolish and maybe you should have employed a professional to deal with your company earlier i.e. an accountant who would have told you NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.

I think you will be off two peoples christmas card lists very soon.

dunsandin

I think I understand what drove the OP to do this - the desire to keep afloat, but I believe he has dug a massive hole for himself and has walked himself into a serious situation. I doubt the original intention was to defraud anybody, but the net outcome may well be far more pain than if the company(he) had acted more prudently and not traded when (probably/possibly)technically insolvent. Trying to couch this in the most favourable terms possible here, not wanting to impune anybody when we are not aware of the OP's intentions and frame of mind at the time, nor of his grasp of the implications of his actions. For the OP's own sake, and for the best outcome, I would say go speak to a solicitor, a good one. While relations with the parties involved are currently civil, that state of play may well change as the situation evolves. Should the finance companies involved decide to assert their rights over the assets involved, this could get very messy. And the only word out of place there is "could".

Alanstrainor

OP i'm going to close this, the only answer to your question has already been given. Seek legal advice from your solicitor.
Thanks.

Anan1

Right, i'm going to lock this on the basis that the best way forward for the OP is to seek professional advice. I hope it works out fairly to all concerned.