For the past couple of years we have been informing clients about an unreported case decided by Chief Registrar Baister involving the requirement to give notice of intention to appoint to the company. The case decided that on a strict interpretation of the legislation, in order to properly effect the appointment of administrators it is necessary to issue a notice of intention to appoint to the company on Form 2.8B whenever the directors are making the appointment, not just where there is a qualifying floating chargeholder. The legislation is silent on how much notice has to be given to the company, so it is just necessary to serve the notice of intention on the company’s registered office. Where this has been changed to the practice address then it is a good idea to also send the notice to former registered office. If you do give notice of intention to appoint you should also use Form 2.9B to make the appointment since a notice of intention to appoint has been issued.
If you do not want to go through the process of issuing a notice of intention to appoint where there are no qualifying floating chargeholders, then arrange for the appointment to be effected by a special resolution of the company at a general meeting. This makes the company the appointor and a separate notice of intention to appoint would not be needed.
We understand that the Insolvency Service are aware of this issue and that it is one of those issues that is likely be fixed in the next round of legislative changes.
