Company boss banned over £145k Covid support claims

The hearing took place at the High Court in London

A businessman has been banned from being a company director after making bogus claims for £145,000 in Covid-19 support grants.

The Insolvency Service said Richard Oliver, 49, of Birkenhead, applied for cash from 21 different local authorities on behalf of his firm Exact Data Trading Co. Ltd.

He received £95,000 from those claims, and then another £50,000 from a Covid Bounce Back loan after providing misleading information to the government.

He has now been disqualified for 15 years from being involved in the promotion, formation or management of a company at a hearing at London's High Court.

Neil North, of the Insolvency Service, said: "Richard Oliver caused his company to deliberately exploit not one but two support schemes designed to help small businesses during the early days of the Covid pandemic.

"We will not tolerate such abuse of public money which is why we sought to remove Oliver from the corporate arena for the longest period possible."

Exact Data was established in September 2019 and operated from Oliver’s home address, sourcing equipment and data on behalf of other third-party companies.

The company applied to at least 21 local authorities in June and July 2020 to be falsely registered for business rates in order to receive Small Business Relief Grants.

The Insolvency Service said Exact Data did not occupy or trade from any of the premises it falsely claimed to be registered at.

It added Oliver supplied "contradictory and unsubstantiated information" to councils in making the applications, and appeared to have created false bank statements to support the claims.

In applying for the £50,000 Covid Bounce Back Loan, Oliver declared that turnover for Exact Data was £220,000 and his business was trading at the time of the application.

However, no trading income was paid into Exact Data’s bank account between the end of March and start of July 2020.

Liquidators were appointed for Exact Data in December 2020.