Working Man’s Club

[SeekingLegalHelp]

My local community are trying to re open our Local Working Men’s club that is run by a committee but hasn’t been open for around a year now.

Apparently the previous committee members ‘closed’ the club but it wasn’t done properly. Does that mean it’s still open and can be reopened by the current committee members?

Theres someone saying that the financial ombudsman’s dissolved the club. I didn’t know the financial ombudsman could do this? Is that right?

if anyone can help or give advice or sign post me to the right people to talk to that would be great.

You can look on the Companies House website to establish whether the Committee ran the club formally as a private limited company and view its status and returns. Running it this way would be the norm, unless the Committee was just a very informal affair. The Financial Ombudsman cannot close a company down; somebody may be confused between the FO and Companies House, who can dissolve a company by striking it off the register - which they’d do if the company failed to file its annual accounts and / or confirmation statement, or they believed it had ceased operating.

If nobody is sure whether the Committee was properly wound down then it’s usually safe to assume that it wasn’t. You need to address this first. There’s guidance here on how to remove or restore a company: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/company-strike-off-dissolution-and-restoration/strike-off-dissolution-and-restoration