Millfield - Money Portal integration will take 6 months

The integration of Millfield into the businesses of its new owner will be at least a six month project says the head of The Money Portal.

Richard Craven, managing director of The Money Portal which bought Sage Financial Services and Millfield Partnership Ltd for £10.6m at the end of last month, says the next step is a bedding in process of the new companies.

Now the deal has been approved by the Financial Services Authority, Craven says over the next few months he will be continuing what he has been doing in meeting as many people as possible explaining how the interaction of the companies will work and reassuring advisers.

He says: “The process will involve reconstructing certain elements of the business, as well as introducing new management and new layers of governance, It is a huge company so it will be at least a six month project.”

The Money Portal’s rescue of Millfield, now rebranded Bates Millfield, came after a rocky few months as the IFA firm tried to find ways to solve its capital adequacy test 2 deficit after talks with a third-party buyer failed in May and the firm failed to raise enough money on a share placing to avoid going into administration.

In addition Millfield faced the threat of legal action over unpaid procreation fees after one of its subsidiaries, mortgage broker firm Millfield South East, went into administration in April, after no fees had been forwarded on from Millfield since January.

The insolvency practitioners, Herron Fisher, which took over Millfield South East, stated the lack of fees was one of the main reasons for the company going into administration and said they were considering taking legal steps to retrieve the money as Millfield had so far been uncooperative.

However since parts of Millfield have been sold to The Money Portal and the remainder of the company has gone into administration with PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Herron Fisher have been brought back to square one as to who they should pursue on behalf of Millfield South East.

Despite instructing their solicitors to contact PwC to try and retrieve the money, so far there has been no reply, although Christopher Herron, of Herron Fisher, says this doesn’t necessarily mean anything as PwC probably have a lot of paperwork to get through.

Meanwhile Craven says: “We did not buy Millfield as a whole, we bought Sage Financial Services and certain other assets, so I think this will probably be an issue for PwC, as we have not bought ant liabilities relating to Milflield South East.”

Herron says: “This may well be the case if The Money Portal only bought certain aspects of the business, although it doesn’t necessarily mean good new for Millfield South East, as we probably have more chance of The money Portal paying, if they are responsible, than retrieving the money from PwC. It seems we’ll just have to wait and see what happens next.”

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