Oddbins will be plunged into administration next week after HM Revenue & Customs refused to back its survival plan.

As the embattled off-licence chain’s largest creditor, the support of HMRC was required to secure the proposed Company Voluntary Agreement.

That would have seen Oddbins’ creditors receive 21p in the pound of what they were owed.

Deloitte, which had been advising Oddbins on the CVA, said creditors would receive 7.5p in the pound if the chain was forced into administration.

"Despite ongoing discussions with HMRC over the last four weeks, the decision was made late yesterday not to support the CVA,” Oddbins said in a statement.

“As HMRC is a significant creditor, this means the CVA cannot proceed and Oddbins is expected to go into administration on Monday 4 April, following the court hearing of the administration application.”

A spokesman for HMRC said: "We do everything we reasonably can to support viable businesses but we have to do the right thing for the country's finances and other creditors when casting our vote."

Oddbins said that its other creditors largely supported the CVA.

“Deloitte confirmed at today’s CVA meeting that, not including the HMRC vote, there was an 84% value vote by proxy in favour of the CVA – showing that a significant majority of creditors clearly wanted to make it work,” the company said.

Deloitte will be formally appointed to handle the administration on Monday.

“Oddbins said at the creditors meeting that they’d had offers of cash injections and that people had approached them interested in buying the business,” one creditor told The Grocer. 

Read more
Oddbins applies for administration to head off winding-up threat (28 March 2011)
In the world of off-licences, is Bargain Booze a bargain? (analysis; 26 March 2011)
Oddbins rescue plan offers creditors just 21p in the pound (17 March 2011)

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