Cream Club Ltd, which supplies marketing materials to estate agents, is the subject of an insolvency notice placed in the London Gazette.
The business bought the assets of Cabec trading as Cream Club, of which Craig Cook was also director, in a pre-pack administration last May.
It means that Cream Club Ltd has traded for only a matter of months. The London Gazette notice follows our report earlier this week that Cabec which traded as Cream Club is moving from administration into creditors’ voluntary liquidation.
A meeting of The Cream Club Ltd’s creditors is to be held under the Insolvency Act on January 18 at 11am, in the Darwin Suite, Holiday Inn Cambridge, Lake View Bridge Road, Cambridge.
Alan Simon, of AABRS, is acting as insolvency practitioner in the case. A different firm, Begbies Traynor, were appointed administrators in the case of Cabec, which they said had run up a debt of over £600,000 to HMRC plus over £151,000 in arrears of wages, salary and holiday pay owed to staff.
Comments (12)
Craig Cook is showing his true colours lately. Agents who dare question him and serve notice to leave are being subjected to lengthy, convoluted emails, him shouting abuse down the phone, threatening them with legal action and breach of contract, bullying and intimidating them to stay.
What a guy. Just the kind of person you want to do business with. The joke is, rumour has it he wants to turn his ‘successful’ business into a franchise model…! Hilarious! I’ve never dealt with a more desperate, vile and deluded con man in my life. You really don’t want to be associated with this crook
www. Homebook.club has been launched, a frantically stripped down version of the Cream Club site. There are Client Performance Managers referenced in the news section who never worked for Homebook.club. Perhaps another attempt at deceiving the clients?
Clients can leave the business immediately. Their contracts cannot be assigned, it’s a fact of law that they must consent. Irrespective they cannot transfer as this is not a like for like transfer. All competent personnel have left. Remaining are three directors who have driven numerous businesses into the ground, one man in IT, one man in voice over, two in animation and one in graphic design. And it’s widely known that they are not paying staff correctly again so are again insolvent.
The contracts refer to the beneficiary of the contract being able to deliver the same services and products. Given Cream Club failed to do this with about 100 staff it’s pretty much impossible to do it with less than 10 and no script writing department!
Any clients looking to leave can do so on the following points:
1. The contract assignment is invalid by law.
2. If it were permitted by law the contract is void as the beneficiary cannot deliver the contract.
3. Cream Club Ltd and CABEC Ltd, who the contracts are with, were both unable to pay their debts.
Check with your lawyer if you like, they will confirm it. Or speak to your old Client Performance Manager like I did. They seem to know the situation pretty well and for some reason are quite happy to tell you what’s going on and not support Craig or Claire!
I joined Cream in March 2014 after relocating my family across the country. After only 3 weeks the company was unable to pay my salary or my relocation package. In my mind that is clearly a company trading from an insolvent position.
In my opinion both Craig Cook and Claire Cook (nee Olphert) should be disqualified from running any business.
Given the history of the individuals involved, why oh why, did the HMRC allow this situation to get so out of hand?
“Under paragraph 4(2)(a) of Schedule 11 to the VAT Act 1994, HMRC may require any taxable entity, to give security or further security for the payment of VAT that is or may become due in future. Particularly when a business has gone through insolvency and been sold to a new company.”
I hope that any Creditors involved in the Liquidation process make representations to the Liquidator to FULLY investigate the involvements of the Directors, making the necessary recommendations under the Directors Disqualification Act that they are not allowed to be Directors, or involved in the Management of any business.
They should also look at the conduct of the Directors, under the new rules, in that they ought reasonably have known at an earlier stage that the company was clearly insolvent, and look to them for a contribution towards the totally indebtedness, from the date they should have been aware.
Being a Director of a Company is a ‘Privilege’ and not a ‘Right’!
Too many Creditors simply take this on the ‘Chin’ and allow Directors to simply walk away after a uncomfortable 1 hour Creditors Meeting scot-free!
I hope that this does not happen in this case…………..but we will see!
These pair of crooks Craig and Claire who run their so called ‘local business’ have completely ruined my life with no sense of concern or regret and they know it. I’m unhappy, worried and all confidence in myself has been lost. They treated all their staff with no respect and everytime pay day came along at the end of every month it made me feel sick to my stomach, having to wait all day to find out if there was money for us to live for the next month. The result every month you ask? Well guess.. No money, ever. Maybe sometimes a tenner which Craig would consider a treat and better than nout. ‘It’ll buy you a drink down pub’. But what about food, Craig? What about travel, Craig? Or bills? Should we have just split it? Oh that’s fine, great idea we must be idiots because 3 pound 30 a month is loads!!!! Greedy gubbings aren’t we? Well I just hope they both come to their senses and just give up! Why carry on a dream which will just be crushed everytime. More lives are going to be destroyed with the new place ‘Homebook.club’ and it sickens me to my very core.
That is a heart breaking story, thank you for having the courage to share it.
I hope the agents who support these monsters read it and realise that by supporting these criminals they’re allowing this abuse to continue.
You wouldn’t treat a dog the way they treat their staff. Thank goodness you saw the light and got out.
Cream / Homebook member agents – are you happy being associated with this?
So this lot set up companies with flawed business plans that make no distributable profits?
Sounds absolutely the kind of thing that crowdfunding was made for.
See https://creamclubthetruth.wordpress.com/ for more details.
Craig Cook and Claire Olphert have run several failed companies. Each time staff and small suppliers are left without pay. Stop supporting this pair of criminals. They have no idea how to run a business. It fails every time.
What an absolute disgrace. What this piece fails to mention is that Cook has already ran 2 or 3 versions of this business into the ground already. Before Cabec it was Cream Worldwide, before this it was Cream etc…the list goes on. Each time the debts and trail of destruction has got bigger and bigger. The biggest failing is HMRC who have now let this idiot run up £2million + of debts…. Any fool can get a business turning over good money by not paying PAYE, VAT, suppliers and wages, its easy. This has to be raised to the next level now, do MP’s have the b**s to do it, doubt it. Do the estate agents have the b**s to do the right thing, probably not. If this newspaper really cares, then make it a proper feature and spread the horror stories so that good honest folk can avoid this cretin at all costs.
The few agents who still use this company should do the right thing and quit now.
Contracts signed with Cabec or Cream Club can be terminated without repercussions.
It’s your chance to escape these toxic people!
When will this end – clearly Craig and Claire are failed business people. The big issue is that they’re ruining peoples lives, staff have lost houses, marriages/relationships, credit rating and their health due to their horrific actions. When will these agents wake up and realise by supporting this failure they are in turn ruining peoples lives!!