Peak Rail Annual Report and Action Group

Given PR history quite probably, but given the element of judgement required in preparing and interpreting accounts, not necessarily.


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These accounts are a snapshot of over 18 ago. It will be very interesting to see the 2018 accounts which I guess will be available from CH around late June. Has the board and management turned the business round I wonder?

 

If they haven't, aren't they trading illegally?

 

Not if they’re meeting their debts when due. Qualified accounts don’t have to mean insolvency.


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The plc 2018 accounts have now been released (I am a shareholder, so received a copy by mail).

On a turnover broadly the same as the previous year, they turned a loss of £111k into a net profit of £51k.

The story behind that is more complicated. They received an exceptional legacy of £110.000 in 2018, so if you deduct that from the result, there is actually a net loss of £49k in 2018.
Legal costs were £77k and £50k in 2017 and 2018 respectively. In 2017 they had an anonymous donation of £100k.

 

It is not showing on the Companies House website yet.

 

I won't. If it's only just been shared to members, it will then have to be approved at the AGM before being sent off to companies House.

 

So essentially they using the large legacies/donations to offset the heavy losses the Plc is suffering to lessen the damage

 

Without seeing the accounts it would seem that way. There are quite a lot of railways that operate this way though. Read the latest SR magazine that seems to suggest that the bluebell lost over 200k last year. Then there is the WSR that seemed to be close to going bankrupt. So the peak rail isn't alone in this.

 

However, if they stopped all the legal action then they would at least break even or even make a small profit

Keith

 

In the cold light of day what has been gained by these legal actions?
What has been lost is self evident. Those sums of money could have been used for site improvements, restoration projects, concerted marketing or further expansion.
The 'feet on the ground' deserve much better.

 

The total cost is a bit hard to find in the A/Rs. I can find the costs of the legal team, but the payouts were harder. I'm not sure if they went through the P&L. Someone could pose the question at the next AGM, it would be interesting to know the complete figure.

More is pending arbitration...

 

I thought it was in the commentary? I’ll have a look.


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The litigation costs are quite difficult to follow, so I’ll post the relevant paragraphs below and maybe others better qualified than I can unravel. I’ll start with the minutes from the 2018 AGM .......




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..... and from the MD’s Statement for year end 2018 .....



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..... and finally from the Notes on the Financial Statements Year End Dec 2018 ......




Note that last one !


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That last one is terrible!!! If that claim goes through at what looks like possible £200,000 then how will the railway be able to cover it?

In defence of the highlighted comments about the 38% increase in marketing Vs on a 7% increase in revenue, that depends on what the % is based on. If the marketing budget was £10,000 and increase to £13,800 (actual £3800) and the revenue was £500,000 which would increase to £535,000 (actual £35,000) then it would be money well spent. Do you have the actual costs at all??

 

Hard to decipher this Gav as marketing spend isn't itemised, and the comment relates to 2016 vs 2017 and I don't have 2016 to hand (but point taken). Anyway, it's pretty irrelevant compared to the swingeing legal costs.

 

My eye was caught by the "robust defence". A familiar phrase...

Noel

 

£130.000 in 'cost of sales'! That is surely 'extraordinary expenditure'. Then items 4 and 5 above, revenue donations £108k under (4) and donations £100k under (5) in 2017, this is all very unclear. The Grinsty case has had a huge impact and there are bits of it scattered all over the accounts. It should all be exceptional, and well explained. It's now hard to see if they are trading at B/E or what. And all this for a turnover of just £370k! Not forgetting the deduction of capitalised labour (£14k) each year from expenditure. I think we should also know more about the director's loan accounts, which increased, nobly, from £20k to £49k but including these in 'ST creditors' makes the company illiquid. Under what terms were these made? Unsecured? That seems unlikely, but there is no mention of security given to anyone in the accounts.