Acumen+giving+you+the+edge
Categories:East Midlands

Freeth Cartwright remains optimistic about debt levels

11 October 2010 | By Andrew Pugh

  • Print
  • Comments (17)

Related Articles

Top 100 firm Freeth Cartwright has a “reasonable expectation” that it will continue as a going concern despite being heavily reliant on overdraft facilities to meet its working capital needs.

The firm’s annual LLP accounts reveal the amount of loans and overdrafts with LloydsTSB rose from £7.1m in 2008-09 to £7.5m in the 2009-10 financial year. The total amount due to creditors in the next year stands at £11.2m.

The amount owed to the firm by trade debtors has risen from £8.9m to £10.1m. A number of those debtors are in the construction and property industries, which account for 38 per cent of overall turnover.

The accounts also reveal the extent of staff cuts over the past financial year, down from 422 to 339, and staff costs slashed from £12.5m to £9.9m. Total fee income was down by 2.8 per cent to £31.6m but operating profit rose 26 per cent to £11.5m, and overall operating costs were reduced from £23.4m to £20.1m.

A statement included in the accounts said: “The LLP meets its day-to-day working capital requirements through overdraft and practice management facilities which have been renewed until 31 July 2011. The forecasts and projections of the business, taking account of reasonably foreseeable changes in trading performance, indicate that we should be able to operate comfortably within the level of our facilities.”

Freeth Cartwright chief executive Peter Smith said: “We’re not concerned at all about our position. These are a static set of figures and aren’t reflective of the overall position - a number of businesses use overdraft facilities, and we have more than sufficient headroom. We do a lot of billing at our year-end, so our borrowings come down dramatically.”

See all Related Jobs, Briefings & CPD/Events

Readers' comments (17)

  • Anonymous | 19-Oct-2010 4:37 pm

    they don't seem 2 have heard of KPI's, unless they think they are nuts they have with their cocktails

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Anonymous | 19-Oct-2010 8:03 pm

    To the above comment by Alexander.
    It does matter how good the firm is, if the work has dried up then the debt is no longer servicable.
    It's a matter of economic not the quality of the firm.
    Now that cuts are going to be made, money is going to be withdrawn from the economy so the chance of gaining work is diminished.

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Anonymous | 20-Oct-2010 10:44 pm

    I knew things were looking bad last year when I saw the partners in the corporate dept wearing polyester suits.

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Albino | 24-Oct-2010 8:34 pm

    The all singing all dancing Freeths Corporate partner has been decked out in polyester suits for years.

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Anonymous | 22-Nov-2010 5:55 am

    Contrary to most of the views expressed on here, Freeths has been run, both on the day to day level and strategically, by accountants, not partners for a very long time, and they do it very well. As a former long-term employee I know from experience that the firm is highly focused on interim billing and cashflow, although as Peter suggests in the article it's impossible to eradicate lawyers' tendency to save a lot of their fees up for the year end.

    I have no doubt that Freeths' management is well up to the task of seeing it through the difficult period that almost all firms are currently experiencing. The worrying thing is that if the Lawyer is writing this sort of thing about Freeths, it is clearly missing a large number of less well-managed firms which are probably in far worse situations.

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Anonymous | 10-Jan-2011 5:48 pm

    The above comment is written by the PR team of Freeth Cartwright...

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

  • Anonymous | 23-Aug-2011 1:09 pm

    I wonder if FC's accounts include the same warning this year?

    Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment

View results 10 per page | 20 per page

Have your say

Mandatory Required Fields

  • Print
  • Comments (17)

Most popular

Most commented

Most emailed