Can I get a refund and my money back if a company goes into Administration?

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Can I get a refund and my money back if a company goes into Administration?

Unfortunately, the short answer is no. If a company enters a formal Insolvency process, you will rank as a creditor. Depending on your status, whether you have some security or not, you will generally rank as an unsecured creditor. A secured creditor would be somebody who has a charge over a property or charge over a specific asset. But most creditors rank as unsecured. which means in the order of priority, you’ll get paid provided there are sufficient funds to pay off some other creditors first, and then unsecured creditors will receive a share. There is no way of getting a refund from the company, because the company is insolvent and it doesn’t have money. And it has to treat all creditors equally.

The best option is normally looking at how you’ve paid for the service or the purchase. So if you’ve bought something on a credit card or possibly on your debit card, then you will have the option of going to your credit card provider or your debit card provider and asking them to give a refund. And that’s a good protective measure. If you’ve just made a bank transfer, paid cash or sent a cheque, you’re not going to have those protections. So unfortunately, you wouldn’t be able to get a refund.

So in short, depending on how you pay for it, you may be able to get a refund but it is really going to be credit card and debit cards. Any other payment outside of that, such as deposit bank transfers or cheques, you’re not going to be able to get a refund and unfortunately you’re going to have to rank with other creditors and wait to see if there’s sufficient realisations within the Insolvency process to enable some funds to be paid to you. But the reality is, it’s unlikely to be all of it, and maybe a very small portion if at all.

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