Taxpayers miss out on millions after ‘phoenixism’ at UK recruitment firms

Practice where companies are liquidated and reacquired, free of debts, thought to cost taxpayers about 800m a year

Insolvent recruitment businesses shorn of their debts then reacquired from administration by the directors or shareholders that presided over their demise are costing the exchequer tens of millions of pounds in lost taxes, a Guardian analysis suggests.

The practice of phoenixism" - the art of liquidating a company and allowing the directors to rise from the ashes with a new entity, free of debts - is estimated by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to have cost taxpayers about 800m a year.