Commercial dispute leads to plumbing firm collapse

Posted 12/01/2010

A high-profile plumbing firm has been forced to cease trading after failing to settle a legal conflict with a rival via dispute resolution.

Service Corps has been served with a bankruptcy petition by Pimlico Plumbers, which had accused the former company of poaching its staff and client details, as well as committing industrial espionage.

According to Pimlico, Service Corps had offered its employees money to breach their contracts and defect, as well as attempting to steal its celebrity clients such as Michael Winner and Helen Mirren.

This led Pimlico’s owner Charlie Mullins to initiate a £1 million compensation claim against Service Corps, which the company intends to resist.

The company has now folded and is being pursued for debts totalling £100,000.

According to the most recent figures from the Insolvency Service, a total of 1,457 companies went bankrupt as a result of winding-up petitions between May and August 2009, representing an 8.7 per cent year-on-year increase.