Member Article

Denizen Contracts in administration

National building contractor Denizen Contracts Ltd has been placed into administration by its chairman and largest shareholder, Paul Bolton, after turn-around efforts failed to secure the construction firm’s viability.

It has brought to a halt work on a £30m hotel at the Hampshire Cricket ground, the Ageas Bowl, just over a year after the project was launched. The first phase of the six-storey Hilton hotel overlooking the ground was completed earlier this year.

The move follows efforts by Mr Bolton and a new board to fix the business after ‘serious flaws’ were unearthed in the pricing of a number of the contracts by the previous management team.

The Standish-based contractor, which specialised in the construction of hotels, spas and leisure facilities, had completed projects in cities across the country, including in Newcastle, Sheffield, Liverpool and Birmingham.

Mr Bolton said problems became apparent in some of the contracts last year, seeing him step in to an executive role from that of chairman and installing a new chief executive to help fix the issues that had been identified.

The current outcome – administration – was never envisaged and it was the new board’s expectation that they would be able to complete the three contracts on its books.

The work undertaken by Mr Bolton and his new team has enabled two of the three projects – hotel developments in Southport and Sheffield – to be novated to another contractor, ensuring the jobs are completed and sub-contractors are protected.

This was not possible at this time in the case of the Southampton scheme and so Duff and Phelps has now been appointed as administrators to identify if buyers can be found for this contract and the company’s assets.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .