Medibureau purchase was a pre-packed deal

29 July 2010 12:00 pm | By Natalie Holt

The sale of outsourced insurance services firm Medibureau to Medicals Direct Group earlier this month was a pre-packed administration deal.

Administrators estimate that liabilities to creditors were around £500,000. Medibureau launched in 2000, arranging medicals and pathology testing for several life insurers. The firm went into administration on July 8 and was sold to Medicals Direct on the same day, with the acquisition announced a week later.

Medicals Direct founder and chief executive officer Mike Benton says: “We bought the business assets that were left so we bought the revenue stream, which includes contracts, and the systems, including Medibureau’s GP reports system. We did not take any liabilities. We think that the Medibureau clients will hopefully get a better service and a stronger company than they had before.”

Peters, Elworthy & Moore recovery partner Shay Lettice is the appointed administrator for Medibureau. Lettice says: “The logic behind the pre-pack was that if we turned off Medibureau’s system, even for a day, then the whole thing would have imploded and there would have been nothing to sell. The bulk of the creditors will be the people that did the examinations and the reports, so nurses and doctors.”
Lettice estimates that there are between 4,000-5,000 of these creditors who are each owed around £100.

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