Five printers have alleged that they have outstanding invoices for work completed for DV8 Media, run by Mark Tudhope. They have all said that Tudhope initially paid for the first small jobs he placed with them before running up debts.

However, Tudhope refuted the claims and said he only had three outstanding invoices with printing firms.

I dont have a problem paying people. I was stung for 32,000 so Ive not paid as quickly as I would have liked to, said Tudhope.

He asked PrintWeek to call him back at a later time, but his mobile phone was not able to receive the call.

Surrey-based Score Printing claims it is owed 1,360 for 50,000 leaflets that it printed in May. Director Nick Black said: Why should I mind if this happens to other companies? Because it isnt right.

A Crawley firm claimed to be owed just under 6,000. One director said: He paid for the first job, the second cheque bounced and then cleared and he paid for the third. Then we did quite a number of jobs in a short space of time. At the end of the day its a lesson if you take on work, you have to make sure that you will be paid.

A Surrey-based company claimed to have 9,200 outstanding with DV8 Media. A spokeswoman said: He gets the work by under-quoting and then doesnt pay. A lot of firms do loss leaders if theyre for a big company and theres the chance of getting extra work. But this is different these are one-off jobs for small firms.

Rupert Rudd, sales director of industry credit checking specialist ICSM, said he had received several enquiries about DV8 Media and related companies.

Story by John Davies