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Our friendly team of expert lawyers has many years of experience helping business with company voluntary arrangements. Let us help you too.

Can a company voluntary arrangement help me?

A company voluntary arrangement is a very useful tool for a company that is experiencing financial problems in paying its creditors but at the same time has a viable ongoing business and has a good plan for recovery and company rescue in the short to medium term.

  • one of the great advantages of a company voluntary arrangement is that it binds all creditors owed money from the date that the company voluntary arrangement is signed and agreed
  • this gives valuable breathing space to a company that is concerned that pressing creditors might bring winding up proceedings against the company before the company has had a chance to turnaround

If you are a business owner of a company that has good prospects but is suffering some short-term cash-flow problems, then a company voluntary arrangement could be a good option for you.

Our experience can help – but don’t delay

One thing our team has learnt in our years of experience in dealing with company rescue situations is that, the sooner you take expert advice, the more options are open to you. This very much applies to company voluntary arrangements.

  • our experience has shown us that creditors are far more likely to agree to a reduction in the amount they will be paid, if they know that this is guaranteed under a company voluntary arrangement
  • they are less likely to be cooperative if they have been chasing you for months and months only to be ignored

It also makes sense that, the earlier you act, the less debts you will have accrued to be negotiated in the company voluntary arrangement, making it less complicated and in turn, inevitably quicker and cheaper to administer.

  • a further benefit of a company voluntary arrangement is that the supervisor of the company voluntary arrangement deals with all the creditors under the arrangement, you simply provide one monthly payment to them, and they do the rest
  • a supervisor is a professional insolvency practitioner, who deals with these situations as their “bread and butter”

As part of a company voluntary arrangement, you can often renegotiate with your creditors, including HM Revenue and Customs and your landlord over rent arrears and ongoing lease obligations.

You may also be able to deal with employees under a company voluntary arrangement, without the usual redundancy problems and payments that ensue.

In a company voluntary arrangement, the directors remain in full control of the company. It is not necessary to notify everyone that your company is in a company voluntary arrangement, so negative publicity is minimal.


If you think that a company voluntary arrangement is something that could work well for your company, contact us to talk it through. At Francis Wilks & Jones, our expert team has many years of experience of acting with companies in company voluntary arrangements. We work with the best licensed insolvency practitioners in the country and you can be confident that these professionals will deal with your matter at a high level.

The insolvency team at FWJ has helped me on a number of complex and protracted matters over the last few years. FWJ are quick to respond and have given me practical and comprehensive solutions to the situtations I have had to deal with. I have always been impressed by the depth of insolvency knowledge and commercial awareness displayed by the team and would not hesitate to instruct FWJ again.

Ian Robert, partner at Kingston Smith

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