Recruitment boss's twice-collapsed firm appears to resurface as a third company despite £3m in debts

A recruitment executive whose company has twice entered insolvency proceedings in just over a year appears to be back in business under a new name, even as creditors chase more than £3m in unpaid debts.

Andrew Woosnam learned the recruitment trade in the 1990s and set up his own firm around the turn of the millennium. Over the following decades he took millions of pounds in salary, dividends and loans, and bought assets including a Berkshire house once owned by the comedians Dawn French and Lenny Henry. The three-hectare (six-acre) property cost £2.2m in 2013 and is now being eyed by insolvency professionals acting for creditors. Those creditors are owed more than £3m by his failed companies, including over £1m owed to the UK taxpayer.

The change in fortunes is stark. Premier Group Recruitment once promoted itself as an award-winning business. Woosnam owned 99% of its shares. The company went into administration in September 2025 owing £2.9m, including £647,000 to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), which had started enforcement proceedings against it.

Three days later, its assets were bought by a new company, PGGBR Ltd, which Woosnam also owned. He made an initial payment of £10,000 and promised administrators a further £600,000 through monthly instalments of £25,000 over two years. On paper, the total beat a competing bidder's cash offer of £321,000. Critics, however, point out that the arrangement bore the hallmarks of a pre-pack administration, a structure seen as risky for creditors. Such deals can let a connected party buy back a business with deferred payment, and several studies have suggested they tend to produce worse outcomes.

That is how it played out here. According to the latest Companies House filings, the promised payments did not arrive, and the new company built up a further £400,000 debt to HMRC. The Guardian approached one of the joint administrators of Premier Group, from KRE Corporate Recovery, but he did not return phone calls about the case.

Woosnam had received a £1.2m director's loan from the defunct Premier Group and had taken almost £2m in dividends from it since 2022. He also appears to have received a further £200,000 through a director's loan from PGGBR before that company was placed into liquidation last month.

The story may not end there. At least eight former Premier Group staff now say they work for a recruitment brand called Xpertis Talent, which was created in July 2026. It looks so similar to the two insolvent companies that even employees appear confused. One consultant who previously worked for Premier Group credited the original company's 2022 industry award to the new venture in marketing materials on LinkedIn. Another employee posted that he began working for the third company before it was registered with Companies House.

Woosnam did not respond to invitations to comment. He is not a shareholder of the latest company, which Companies House filings show is wholly owned by an individual based in Thailand. Woosnam is understood to have Thai family, but it is unclear whether they are connected to the new business. It is also unclear whether he is behind its creation.