A SHIPLEY man has been disqualified from business for seven years after failing to ensure his company kept proper books and records.

John Thomas Hanbury, 60, from Shipley, was a director of payroll processing company Crownsbury Limited.

The company had not operated a payroll processing bureau prior to his appointment on January 4, 2016.

On July 18 of that year, the company, based in Central Square, Wellington Street, Leeds, entered into administration and a subsequent investigation found that during Hanbury’s tenure he had failed to ensure Crownsbury maintained and/or preserved adequate accounting records.

He also failed to deliver adequate accounting records to the joint administrators when required to do so, and as a result it has not been possible to verify what the company’s income and expenditure was after May 3, 2016, the date its bank account was closed.

Further investigations found it was not possible to determine the reason for receipts totalling £7,849 received between March 24 and April 8, 2016, into Crownsbury’s bank account from a connected company, of which Hanbury is a director, as well as determining the reason for a receipt of £520,000 into the company’s account on April 15.

There were a number of other payments out of the company’s bank account for which no proper explanation of verification could be found.

Following the investigation, on August 7 this year, the Secretary of State accepted a disqualification undertaking from Hanbury, after he did not dispute that he failed to ensure the company maintained and/or preserved, or alternatively following administration, deliver up adequate accounting records to the joint administrators.

His ban will run from August 28 and it will last for seven years.

Anthea Simpson, chief investigator for the Insolvency Service, said: “Directors have a duty to ensure their companies maintain proper accounting records, and, following insolvency, deliver them to the office-holder in the interests of fairness and transparency.

“Without a full account of transactions it is impossible to determine whether a director has discharged his duties properly, or is using a lack of documentation as a cloak for impropriety.”

Hanbury is banned from being a company director, taking part in the promotion, formation or management of a company, or being a receiver of a company’s property.