Warrington customers owed 'over £160,000' by bankrupt garage

As reported in the Warrington Guardian last week, Crest Motorsport North West Ltd. filed for bankruptcy in March this year, with its director, Tom Seddon, saying: "Every avenue to allow the business to continue has been explored, inevitably these have been intangible.

"The business cannot continue with the volume of debt and unfulfilled customers associated."

The garage on Slutchers Lane specialised in Japanese cars (Image: Supplied)

Since then a number of customers have been in touch to share their stories of the collapsed firm.

Jake (not his real name) said that he was owed more than £9,000 when the garage suddenly shut up shop, and an ex-employee had to phone the garage's clients and inform them of the closure.

Jake said: "[My car] was dropped off at the garage in June 2021, and supposed to be completed by end of August.

"After around a month of the missed original deadline was when I realised it wasn't going to be completed."

Jake alleged that his car was 'left outside his unsecured site with no gates, unlocked with the key in the ignition.'

"We simply pushed it onto a trailer, as anyone could and drove off," he added.

Jake alleges that he spent more than £9,000 on orders that were not fulfilled by the garage (Image: Supplied)

Jake explained that he has recently been awarded around £7,000 from the Small Claims Court, as Mr Seddon did not show up to the hearing.

Another aggrieved customer has collated individual allegations, he said: "I have a spreadsheet going, I believe it's over £160,000 now."

One ex-employee, Dan (not his real name) said: "We had years of overdue bills and accepted too many jobs, leaving the place booked up fully for the foreseeable."

Dan continued: "There was no other way out unless all of [the staff] could survive on £0 for two years."

Mr Seddon has been contacted for comment but has not responded.

Dan said: "[Mr Seddon] really did try everything to keep the place going from the outside."

Mr Seddon filed for personal bankruptcy not long after the garage closed its doors.

One customer has kept a running tally of money spent on unfulfilled orders, which is allegedly more than £160,000

Rupert Potter was hit in a different way, as the director of 'Crest Motorsport' - a completely unrelated company.

Mr Potter said: "Crest Motorsport North West Ltd. set up quite a long time after us and made themselves look like a branch of ours.

"We use to get calls from their customers asking for parts that hadn't been sent, refunds on poor products etc., but we couldn't help and redirected people back to them.

"When they collapsed we started receiving a lot of calls - many people were convinced we were related companies and that we should help with their issues."

Cheshire Constabulary confirmed that the issue is being treated as a civil matter, not a criminal one.