Hello - we are the new owners of Skandium.com, read more about us here.
The demise of Skandium Limited was a surprise to a lot of it’s old loyal customers, partners and suppliers and we thought it would make sense to give you the background seen from our perspective.
WHAT HAPPENED?
Skandium Limited (https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/03656472) was incorporated in 1998. In May 2019 it went into insolvency. Skandium Limited, in short, ran out of cash and administrators (Elwell Watchorn & Saxton) took over and put up the assets for sale. All the people working at Skandium Limited, it's CEO, founders, directors etc, have been made redundant. All creditors (suppliers, VAT, prepaying customers etc) are now in line at the administrators with their claims. Administrators went to the market with the Skandium Limited assets, trying to minimise their losses. Insolvency is a sad story for everyone involved. There typically are no winners, and we have spoken to many past customers, suppliers and in particular past employees that has lost their jobs because of this. It's just a tough spot to be in, and there is very little anyone can do to help.
HOW DID WE BECOME A PART OF THIS?
We have always loved the Skandium brand, and when we heard of the administration process we thought we'd try to raise the funds to buy out some of the assets and salvage what we can. We have bought some of the stock, domain names, trademarks and a few other related items. We have put a new team in place and are slowly building momentum with online/offline sales operations etc.
WHAT CONNECTION DO WE HAVE WITH THE PAST SKANDIUM LIMITED BUSINESS ENTITY?
In short, none at all. We have met the previous management a few times during hand over, but that is it. We have no access to any order records, customer data, warehouse management system etc. And we have started all over with suppliers. At this stage we trying to get an overview of what is in the stock, but it is thousands of items so it will take months. We have no legal obligation, liability or any hand in the past Skandium Limited doings. We have simply bought some of their assets. The money that past clients have paid to Skandium Limited for goods not delivered did not come to us, that is now with the administrators. So we have not benefitted from any of the Skandium Limited customer payments.
WHAT HAPPENS TO PAST ORDERS, GIFTCARDS, PREPAYMENTS ETC?
We can see that the vast majority (+80% so far would be our guess) would have been refunded by their credit/debit card provider or paypal. We have tried to help out as much as we can during that process. We have also offered significant discounts to those customers that wanted to 're-buy' their goods from us. It's not always been possible as we have not setup a trading relationship with all suppliers yet. But we are doing what we can to get that in place asap.
WHY CAN'T WE JUST HONOUR ALL PAST ORDERS, PREPAYMENTS AND GIFT CARDS?
All those orders went to Skandium Limited. The customer and Skandium Limited made a transaction where Skandium Limited were not able to meet it's obligation. Customers paid Skandium Limited, via credit/debit card, PayPal or bank transfer. In either of those cases we were not paid, and in many cases the suppliers of Skandium Limited were not paid. It's very tragic, and it accumulates to hundreds of thousands of punds of losses collectively for the customers, suppliers and partners of Skandium Limited. But all this was before we came on board. We have no relationship with the past business, and we have no hand in their demise. We can not honour Skandium Limited commitments. Legally it would not be possible, as the legal agreement (between the buyer and seller) was not made with us. Practically it would not be possible, as we have no access to customer records (administrators specifically required this for privacy reasons), order history or even inventory management systems. And finally, financially it is not a realistic option for us to take upon us this debt/liability - we did not receive the payments/services that was supplied to Skandium Limited, we can not give refunds or goods in return.
More questions? We’d love to hear from you, contact us at letstalk@skandium.com.
We look forward to telling you more about our many plans for Skandium.com.
Our very best,
Rasmus & Jacob