Serepisos on the brink
Shane Cowlishaw in the Dom Post reports:
Terry Serepisos is flying to Zurich in a bid to save the Phoenix football team and four of his other companies – but Inland Revenue is pushing ahead with plans to liquidate them.
The IRD says it is owed more than $3.5 million in outstanding tax and penalties and wants to advertise its plans to liquidate the companies. Mr Serepisos applied to the High Court at Wellington to stop the advertisements, but a judge refused and the adverts are due to run in The Dominion Post tomorrow.
Justice Forrie Miller was told at an urgently arranged hearing on Friday that Mr Serepisos was going to Zurich this week to sign loan documents that would allow IRD and other creditors to be paid within three weeks, assuming various conditions were met.
However, Inland Revenue doubted Mr Serepisos would be able to meet the conditions.
A draft of the loan documents that it had seen contained a condition that the companies wanting the bailout be solvent at present.
If the companies are not solvent, then the issue of liability of directors for trading while insolvent may arise.
The five companies owe around $3.5m to the IRD, being approx:
- PAYE $1.6m
- GST $1.9m
- Kiwisaver $0.1m
- Income Tax $150
Even worse, almost all the money owed is not money from the companies, but money collected from employees and customers in trust for the IRD.