Hartlepool Firm's Collapse Leaves Suppliers Facing an Empty Pot...
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Hartlepool Business 'Oak Electrotechnical's' Collapse Leaves Creditors Facing £178,000 Shortfall as More Than £275,000 in Claims Revealed...
19th August 2026
New insolvency documents have revealed the scale of the debts left behind by a Hartlepool Company — suggesting ordinary suppliers could struggle to recover anything they're owed at all.
Fresh documents filed following the collapse of Hartlepool-based Oak Electrotechnical Ltd have revealed creditor claims running to more than £275,000, with the company's own Statement of Affairs predicting a substantial shortfall and presently showing nothing available for ordinary unsecured creditors.
The Teesside & Durham Post previously reported that Oak Electrotechnical was heading towards liquidation after an alleged dramatic deterioration in its finances. Its last published accounts showed cash reserves curiously nosediving from £669,457 to just £160,712 in the space of just twelve months, while total current assets dropped from around £1.57 million to £671,697. Those accounts had nevertheless been prepared on a going-concern basis and approved by directors Anthony Sewell and Kate Emmerson Sewell back in January 2026. (The Teesside), with Stephen Kenny and Richard Cole of KBL Advisory Limited now formally appointed as the firms liquidators..
More than £275,000 in creditor and employee claims
The creditor schedule submitted to Companies House also comprises of a list of 27 non-employee creditor entries totalling £218,960.40.
A separate schedule identifies claims involving 12 employees amounting to a further £56,085.82.
Taken together, it produces a listed creditor and employee claim sheet of approximately £275,046 before taking account of the value of security held by finance companies or money recovered from company assets.
After allowing for secured assets, estimated realisations and the insolvency priority structure, the Statement of Affairs calculates an estimated deficiency as regards creditors of £178,801.43. After the company's meagre £100 share capital is included, the overall deficiency is shown as £178,901.43.
HMRC owed more than £53,000
Among the biggest creditors is the taxpayer, where the Statement of Affairs records:
HMRC VAT — £48,046.74 & HMRC PAYE — £5,381.38, leaving HM Revenue & Customs with claims totalling £53,428.12.
Both amounts are recorded as secondary preferential debts in the Statement of Affairs, where under the insolvency priority rules, specified VAT and PAYE liabilities rank ahead of ordinary unsecured creditors such as suppliers. HMRC's guidance confirms that secondary preferential debts are paid after ordinary preferential claims but before non-preferential creditors.
Employees owed more than £56,000
The company's 12 listed employee claims total £56,085.82. Of that sum, £12,670.82 is classified as preferential, while another £43,415 is shown as unsecured employee debt. The company also records £1,738.17 owed to the NEST pension scheme.
Local and national suppliers among those owed thousands
The creditor list also reveals a trail of unpaid suppliers, with one of the largest ordinary trade creditors is electrical wholesaler Rexel, listed as being owed £27,389.54.
Other claims include:
Mains Electrical Distributors Ltd — £3,986.99
Hartlepool Plumbing Centre — £2,043.93
Howdens — £1,088.22
QBE UK Limited — £667.62
MKM Building Supplies — £408.93
There are also smaller amounts due to Wolseley, Yess Electrical Supplies, Fixings Tyne Tees, InterFuels and local firm J&B Recycling.
Collectively the Statement of Affairs puts trade and expense creditors at £35,976.68.
The difficulty for those businesses is that they sit considerably further down the insolvency payment hierarchy & is likely to have to be written off as 'Bad Debt', adding further pressures to struggling local businesses.
HSBC loan also caught in collapse with a 'Bounce Back Loan'...
Financial institutions are shown with unsecured claims totalling £25,371.65. The overwhelming majority of this consists of an HSBC debt of £24,992.93, alongside smaller sums due to Capital on Tap and American Express.
Separately, a substantial fleet of financed vehicles means companies including Northridge Finance, Allica Financial Services, Novuna, Motonovo Finance and BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions also feature prominently among Oak Electrotechnical's creditors, with the outstanding finance associated with those vehicles totalling more than £102,000.
Vehicles worth nearly £249,000 on paper — but liquidators expect to raise just £71,550...
Perhaps one of the starkest illustrations of the difference between a company's accounts and what assets can actually produce during insolvency comes from the firms vehicle fleet, where financed vehicles reportedly carry a combined book value of approximately £248,853.
Yet the Statement of Affairs estimates that those same vehicles will in reality raise only around £71,550 when disposed of.
A dramatic reversal in less than two years which will no doubt be questioned by the firms liquidators.
The figures make the deterioration of the firm all the more striking & is likely to prompt liquidators to question both directors of the company to establish how the firm spiralled into insolvency in such a short space of time, especially when back in April 2024, Oak Electrotechnical reported it had more than £669,000 in cash.
Twelve months later that had fallen to just £160,712.
By July 2026, the company was then preparing a Statement of Affairs showing creditors facing an estimated deficiency of almost £179,000 with liquidators no doubt wanting to ask just where over half a million pounds worth of cash has gone ?
But for now, the next stage will now be for liquidators Stephen Kenny and Richard Cole to establish what the company's assets are actually worth, pursue recoverable debts and determine whether sufficient funds ultimately exist to declare dividends to any of the firms creditors, however for the firms ordinary suppliers, the numbers published so far make for uncomfortable reading.
And those owed money from the business likely to be asking
Where's the Money Gone ?
