Allansons LLP goes into voluntary liquidation

Allansons LLP, the solicitors behind a collapsed investment scheme which offered returns of 50% over 6-18 months, described as “zero risk” and “100% secure” by its third-party introducers, has gone into voluntary liquidation.

Voluntary liquidation indicates that sole director Roger Allanson instigated the process rather than investors doing so.

Allansons LLP raised c. £20 million from investors to fund it bringing cases on behalf of mortgage borrowers who had been the victim of “automatic mortgage capitalisation”.

A statement of affairs filed by Roger Allanson claims that the company is due £24 million in costs and fees from the various mortgage capitalisation cases it took on, which it represented would generate returns of 50% to investors in a 6-18 month timescale. When Allansons was shut down by the SRA, its clients were told to find other solicitors. How much if any Allansons LLP is still due to receive in client fees is unknown. Allanson’s statement of affairs says that of this £24 million, the amount that can be recovered is “Uncertain”.

£105,000 is also owed by members to the partnership. Since July 2019 the only member of Allansons LLP has been Roger Allanson. Allanson appears to be unaware of how much of the £105,000 he can afford to pay back to his own company, listing the amount recoverable as “Uncertain”.

The only other assets of Allansons LLP are £75,000 worth of book debts and £3,000 of furniture.

A total of £23 million is owed by Allansons to creditors, including £20 million owed to litigation funding investors.

“100% secure with FSCS” claims

Third-party introducers claimed that the investment was backed by the FSCS by way of a complicated structure which involved an obscure insurance broker, Box Legal, undertaking to compensate investors if the litigation insurance didn’t pay out (which it didn’t).

Box Legal recently filed accounts for August 2019 (i.e. a few months after the collapse of the scheme) which show no sign of recognising any liability for the £20 million lost.

The details of Allansons’ investors were sold without investors’ consent to cold-callers who contacted investors offering other litigation investments. Who obtained and sold on the Allansons investor list is unknown.

An action group on Facebook remains active (at time of writing it had over 250 posts in the last month) but details are private.