Guarantee not being honoured

Broseley

We have now been advised that if we take the roofers to court they will simply dissolve the company to get out of it. I've done some research and companies house say the limited company was dissolved in Jan 2018, so presumably they are now sole traders and can dissolve at any time. Another company came out today, with an excellent reputation. The surveyor said the roof is in a bad way and will need completely redoing. This will be very expensive as it includes the parapet walls.

Mistral001

Broseley said:

We have now been advised that if we take the roofers to court they will simply dissolve the company to get out of it. I've done some research and companies house say the limited company was dissolved in Jan 2018, so presumably they are now sole traders and can dissolve at any time. Another company came out today, with an excellent reputation. The surveyor said the roof is in a bad way and will need completely redoing. This will be very expensive as it includes the parapet walls.

You will have no claim on them as your contract was with a  Ltd company and that has been dissolved. 

BTW a sole trader business cannot be dissolved. It can cease trading but the sole trader who owns the business will still be personally responsible for any debts in connection with the business he ran.  If you had decided to go with a sole trader business then you could have made a claim against the person who ran the business .  Limited liability means what it says.

Broseley

Mistral001 said:

Broseley said:

We have now been advised that if we take the roofers to court they will simply dissolve the company to get out of it. I've done some research and companies house say the limited company was dissolved in Jan 2018, so presumably they are now sole traders and can dissolve at any time. Another company came out today, with an excellent reputation. The surveyor said the roof is in a bad way and will need completely redoing. This will be very expensive as it includes the parapet walls.

You will have no claim on them as your contract was with a  Ltd company and that has been dissolved. 

BTW a sole trader business cannot be dissolved. It can cease trading but the sole trader who owns the business will still be personally responsible for any debts in connection with the business he ran.  If you had decided to go with a sole trader business then you could have made a claim against the person who ran the business .  Limited liability means what it says.

We moved into the house in July 2018, by which time (unbeknown to us) the roofer had become a sole trader. It was at this point that he agreed to transfer the guarantee (or at least his daughter did) and we paid £100 for the insurance backing to be transferred and he did come out and do some work under that guarantee in October 2018. So surely our contract was with the sole trader company, even though it was a Ltd company when the roof was originally done?

Ectophile

If it's an insurance backed guarantee, have you tried contacting the insurance company?

Broseley

Ectophile said:

If it's an insurance backed guarantee, have you tried contacting the insurance company?

No because after we had paid £100 to transfer it they told us that they no longer cover this company, only if they go bust.