Marian Daniel Clipici, 35, has been barred from serving as a director for 7 years after failing to maintain proper records while his company was in operation.
According to paperwork submitted to Companies House, Romanian citizen Marian Clipici served as Dahlial Limited’s only director. Dahlial Limited conducted construction work starting in November 2017. However, it also served as the location for Southampton’s Dahlia Restaurant, a Romanian eatery that recently went out of business.
He was also a director of Dani-Deea Ltd, which runs a Romanian grocery store in Southampton, up to July 2021.
In September 2021, the business stopped operating and entered liquidation. The Insolvency Service launched an inquiry after the liquidator pointed up a number of issues.
Investigators discovered Marian Clipici could not account for more than £530,000 sent into the company’s bank account between June 2019 and the time of bankruptcy, including a £40,000 Bounce Back Loan made to the firm in May 2020.
The accounts also revealed a comparable amount paid out over the same time period, bringing the total value of transactions to over £1 million. However, owing to a lack of accounting records and paperwork, it was impossible to prove that any of these transactions were for legal corporate payments.
Businesses may only get assistance under the Bounce Back Loan program if they planned to utilize the funds for their own gain. However, Marian Clipici was unable to demonstrate that the Bounce Back Loan was legitimately secured or utilized to sustain his firm during the Covid epidemic.
In the next four months after the Bounce Back Loan was deposited into the business’s bank account in May 2020, Marian Clipici withdrew £30,000. He claimed the payments were for business expenditures and subcontractors, but he was unable to convince the investigators that they were indeed company payments.
Marian Clipici claimed £12,600 during the business’s insolvency, however the liquidator was unable to verify this claim because of his insufficient corporate documents.
The firm owes £60,396 in total, including the £40,000 bounce back loan to the bank and more than £7,000 to the tax authorities, according to the liquidators.
Marian Daniel Clipici’s disqualification undertaking was accepted by the Secretary of State for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy after he did not dispute that he had failed to make sure Dahlial Limited had maintained sufficient books and accounting records or that he had failed to give the liquidator access to those records that had been maintained.
His disqualification will take effect on September 20, 2022, and will last for seven years. Without the court’s approval, the disqualification undertaking forbids Clipici from participating directly or indirectly in the founding, management, or marketing of a firm.
According to Lawrence Zussman, deputy director of insolvent investigation
All directors are required by law to keep proper corporate accounting records, which is essential to ensuring the legitimacy of business activities.
Marian Daniel Clipici has been rightfully barred from the business world for a period of seven years, and his disqualification ought to serve as a reminder to other directors that if you don’t take your duties as a director seriously, you face the danger of losing your position.