A winding-up petition is a process where an unpaid creditor (who is owed more than £750) petitions to have the debtor company compulsorily wound up. The creditor submits a winding-up petition to the courts and serves notice on the debtor company to commence the compulsory liquidation process.
The Gazette
The main place that you will find winding up petitions advertised is in The Gazette. The Gazette is one of the official public records of the British government. There are regional versions of The Gazette, but as a rule, all petitions advertised in England and Wales will be published in the London Gazette.
After the creditor has served the notice to the debtor company, they must wait a minimum of seven days before advertising the notice in The Gazette. The notice must also be served at least seven days before the scheduled court hearing.
As The Gazette is a public record, the advertisement effectively means that the winding-up petition is within the public realm and anyone can see that company is subject to a winding-up petition.
The notice contains information about when and where the petition will be heard. It also invites those with an interest to support or oppose the petition or give notice of their intention.
The Gazette publishes all of the winding-up petitions that they receive on a daily basis here.
The page lists all of the winding-up petition notices submitted to The Gazette in reverse order from those submitted the previous day back to those submitted in 1998. If you know that a creditor has advertised a petition on the previous day, you may want to browse through the records to find the relevant notice, but if you are looking for an older petition or are not sure if a petition has been advertised yet, it’s much easier to use the search function on the site.
The online version of The Gazette is the official version, but you can also order a printed version of the relevant publication (the London Gazette, Edinburgh Gazette, Belfast Gazette etc) by contacting them here.
Having the winding-up petition advertised in The Gazette is very serious: banks and other creditors often check the petition on a daily basis and will freeze the company’s bank accounts and/or attach to the petition for unpaid debts as appropriate.
After the petition has been advertised, the next stage in the process will be the court hearing where the court will (if it thinks it is appropriate), make a winding-up order. A winding-up order is different to a winding-up petition. The making of the winding-up order marks the moment that the company officially goes into liquidation. The Gazette also advertises all of the winding-up orders issued by the courts on a separate part of the site.
We Can Help
If you’ve received a winding-up petition or are facing creditors threatening to issue a winding-up petition, we can help. Call us on 0208 444 2000 to discuss.