EventElephant

Bordeo

i dont believe for one second that the funds are held in a seperate account

Oryx

Bordeo wrote: »

i dont believe for one second that the funds are held in a seperate account

That story is in the same league as Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.

Graham

If the company does successfully enter examinership, I wonder what class of creditor will be assigned to the charities that are still owed money?

If they are considered to be unsecured creditors doesn't this mean they will only receive a dividend (a proportion of the amount owing to them) and this dividend will be calculated after secured creditors have been paid? If the company fails to survive the Examinership isn't the dividend reduced further as the costs of the Examinership are deducted before dividends?

If the money owing to the charities is held in 'trust' are they even considered to be creditors or does this mean their funds are protected as they are not considered to be assets of the company?

Event Elephant: Alan

Dear Graham,

All Event Organisers funds, whether or not they are a charity, are held in a trust account and not considered a creditor. Hence all organisers will be paid as per our terms and conditions. No organisers funds are affected by examinership.

Oryx

Event Elephant: Alan wrote: »

Dear Graham,

All Event Organisers funds, whether or not they are a charity, are held in a trust account and not considered a creditor. Hence all organisers will be paid as per our terms and conditions. No organisers funds are affected by examinership.

So do your t&cs extend to holding funds for over 12 months, given that normal chargeback processes take nowhere near that long?

Bordeo

has anybody gotten any independent confirmation from the examiner that the funds owed are held in a seperate account. i wouldnt believe a word that comes out of Barretts mouth at this stage

Peterdalkey

In Liquidation now



Court orders wind-up of events website

Thursday, August 08, 2013

The High Court has ordered the winding up of Eventelephant, a software firm which creates webpages to advertise and sell tickets for various events.
By Aodhan O’Faolain and Ray Managh
The court made the order after being told the company has no prospect of survival.

The company provided a self-service online event registration website called eventelephant.com. It processes ticket payments on behalf of the event organiser for which it receives a commission.

It’s Irish clients include RTÉ, the IRFU, An Post, the ESB, the Law Society of Ireland as well as British Airways, Arsenal FC and Newcastle Utd FC in the UK.

The company had been in examinership since mid-July.

Yesterday, following an application by the firm’s interim examiner Joseph Walsh, Mr Justice Paul McDermott removed the protection of the courts from the company.

The judge also appointed Mr Walsh and Neil Hughes as joint liquidators of the firm.

Last month the company, of White Ash, Ashbourne, Co Meath, entered examinership after experiencing cash-flow difficulties.

The company’s directors had petitioned the court for Mr Walsh’s appointment arguing it had a reasonable prospect of survival if certain measures could be agreed with its creditors.

However yesterday, solicitor Barry Lyons for Mr Walsh asked the court to end the examinership because monies promised by the firm’s directors to pay wages during the period of protection had not been made available.

Staff were leaving the company and in order protect the value of the firm’s assets, maximise the return to creditors, and save some of the jobs it was appropriate Eventelephant be wound up.

Mr Lyons added Mr Walsh also had concerns about a criminal investigation into the company being undertaken by Revenue.

Mr Walsh also had sought information about €1.4m in funds which had not been paid over by the company to parties who had organised events. That information was not provided.

The appointment of a liquidator would protect those funds pending the completion of an investigation regarding the status of those funds, the court heard.

Lawyers for both the company and Revenue told the court they had no objections to the applications sought by Mr Walsh.

After making the order to wind-up the company the judge adjourned the matter to a date in early September.

Earlier this year the company was the subject of a number of complaints on RTÉ’s Liveline programme from event organisers who claimed they had not been paid their money.

In response the company said the delays were caused by “chargebacks” or payments that are challenged by credit card holders when they get their statements, if they don’t recognise the transaction. The firm added it was doing everything it could to resolve the issues.

Bordeo

thats not really a suprise with the way they ran their business. So basically anyone that is owed money is screwed. the fact they are saying the funds were held in a seperate account is probably false

Oryx

€1.4 million. There are words to describe these guys but the swear filter would cover them.

WAPAIC

Peterdalkey wrote: »

In Liquidation now
Mr Lyons added Mr Walsh also had concerns about a criminal investigation into the company being undertaken by Revenue.

I'd love to hear what Alan has to say about all this, including the mentioned criminal investigation.

Oryx

WAPAIC wrote: »

I'd love to hear what Alan has to say about all this, including the mentioned criminal investigation.

I doubt we will hear from him again. His goose is cooked.

WAPAIC

From the article above, it looks like they haven't paid their tax, their customers or their creditors in which case they would deserve everything they get.

r3nu4l

WAPAIC wrote: »

From the article above, it looks like they haven't paid their tax, their customers or their creditors in which case they would deserve everything they get.

The company directors and finance people deserve what they get if there has been criminal activity.

The individual staff at EventElephant probably knew nothing about any of this or what was going on and are now out of a job. That's never nice They also don't share any of the blame for what their company did and shouldn't be treated as if they did. I hope that they find employment soon, they are real people many of whom will have families to support and possibly mortgages too.

Peterdalkey

Of course it is very sad when anyone loses their job, but the "issues" regarding the operating methods of this company have been widely known for a number of years, this very thread is just over 2 years old. It is hard to believe that the ordinary staff were unaware of the concerns that were being expressed publically about the company. I would doubt that the demise came as any surprise to the workers there. I can fully appreciate that jobs are not easily come by these days and some would have held on until they could get something more stable.
As I understand it, the company also had a very high level of staff turnover, which is very typical for any shady operation. I do hope those who were employed by the company to the end are successful in finding new positions.

vicwatson

Talking about this shower on Joe Duffy show now

vicwatson

€17,000.00 owed to DEBRA charity, jaysus, Directors are a disgrace

Oryx

vicwatson wrote: »

€17,000.00 owed to DEBRA charity, jaysus, Directors are a disgrace

The biggest disgrace is that they lied to the bitter end.

Joey99

Just my 2c but, in the light of the liquidation of this company today - http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/court-orders-wind-up-of-events-website-239221.html - anyone owed money by this company should get on to the joint liquidators in this matter in writing and with copy also by email. The liquidators are Joseph Walsh and Neil Hughes and their firm is:

Hughes Blake & Co
Joyce House
22/23 Holles Street
Dublin 2

The references to monies being held in a trust account earlier in this thread may not be entirely incorrect since it is entirely normal for credit card companies to impose significant reserve accounts on this type of merchant. The reference in the Examiner article to the examiner having concerns about a criminal investigation by Revenue (if true) would be of considerable concern.

Missing Links

Joey99 wrote: »

Just my 2c but, in the light of the liquidation of this company today - http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/court-orders-wind-up-of-events-website-239221.html - anyone owed money by this company should get on to the joint liquidators in this matter in writing and with copy also by email. The liquidators are Joseph Walsh and Neil Hughes and their firm is:

Hughes Blake & Co
Joyce House
22/23 Holles Street
Dublin 2

The references to monies being held in a trust account earlier in this thread may not be entirely incorrect since it is entirely normal for credit card companies to impose significant reserve accounts on this type of merchant. The reference in the Examiner article to the examiner having concerns about a criminal investigation by Revenue (if true) would be of considerable concern.

Rang and left a message and then sent them 2 emails...didn't get anything back (even an acknowledgement).No doubt they're swamped in fairness.Has anybody else been in touch and heard anything back?Ta.

I'm owed over €3000 from 3 fundraisers for Bohemian FC.Some of it was going to Focus Ireland and I've had to pay out €1000 in prizemoney from my own pocket for a Fantasy Football comp I ran in July/August last year.Sickener.

Bordeo

has anybody managed to get in touch with Hughes and Blake. Have left messages but nothing back

Missing Links

Bordeo wrote: »

has anybody managed to get in touch with Hughes and Blake. Have left messages but nothing back

I spoke with the person handling the file about 10 days ago.He said that their investigation was underway and that they were contacting third parties.He indicated that correspondence would be issuing to those who had been in contact with them and mentioned that a first batch (which I wasn't in) would be issuing shortly.I've since sent them a few emails but haven't received any response.

I've also had a few email exchanges with Al but he has stopped replying!

I'm not confident and glad that the money from the fantasy football comp I'm currently running on EE is going into my PayPal account.

Bordeo

Article below in the Irish Indo

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/businessman-in-hospital-after-legal-papers-served-29537345.html

MOD Edit: All this is alleged until proven, so lets let the courts do their job.

Roscoe Holscomb

Wow, it looks like its all coming out now. With revenue as a major creditor I would guess its highly unlikely event organisers will see even a small percentage of what they are owed following the liquidation. Maybe Karmic retribution is the best we can hope for.

Roscoe Holscomb

I'm sure that the money was only resting in Alan's account (allegedly).

Bordeo

any updates lads. how have ye faired out with eventelephant

Missing Links

Bordeo wrote: »

any updates lads. how have ye faired out with eventelephant

No word from anybody.I had the following email exchange with Al before he checked into St John of Gods...

Firstly is there any further news re the longstanding chargebacks on my 3 events?

Secondly,I'm currently running another event with the money gathered going into my
PayPal Account.The reduction in fees from 4.75% to 3% only happened last Saturday
or so.Would appreciate if you would clarify the position...am I or the participants owed
money?

We will give you a promotional code to ensure you have deduction

I will also follow up on other events

Kind regards


Al

Any word Al

Is there anybody there??

Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently:

Alan.Barrett@eventelephant.com

Technical details of permanent failure:
Google tried to deliver your message, but it was rejected by the server for the recipient domain eventelephant.com by office.eventelephant.com. [77.246.42.178].

The error that the other server returned was:
550 5.1.1 User unknown

Roscoe Holscomb

no word yet after contacting the liquidators, but I think if my memory serves me correctly there is another high court hearing re: EventElephant scheduled in October, so maybe we shall hear from the liquidators following that?

Enigma365

Hi All,

Just reading about all this as I hadnt heard about it (I live in London).

We ran an event back in October 2012 and had a nightmare of a time getting the money we were due. In the end we got paid after constantly posting on their facebook page and after I emailed all their employees inidivually, explaining that they were working for a fraudulent company(email address found through linkedin).

The director Alan continued to lie to my face that 8 out of our 120 atendees, all of whom we know personally, had challenged the £5 ticket fee with their bank/credit card issuer.

While I'm sure most of their employees were not involved in anything criminal, there is no question that they would have known something was seriously amiss. Maybe they were fooled by Alan and his lies...

Missing Links

Anybody else trying to sign into their event elephant account?It won't recognise my email or password!!

Missing Links

Anybody heard anything lately?I understand that the Liquidator has 'disposed of' the EE site.