Printed Books Ltd and Offset Printers Ltd were the subject of winding-up orders at a hearing at Manchester District Registry on 18 October.
Printed Books Ltd traded as Book Printer UK, The Printing Press, and UK Print. The firm’s previous names were Litho Printing Ltd and Paper Press Ltd.
Offset Printers Ltd traded as Paperback Printer, Hardback Book Printer, and Magazine & Catalogue Printer. The firm’s previous name was Ink Paper Ltd.
Offset Printers Ltd currently has one active director: Edward Anil Joseph with an address in India. The firm’s former directors are Clair Rosina Hunnisett, Stuart Ralph Poppleton and Aquil Raees.
Printed Books Ltd currently has no active directors. The directors previously listed at the company were Clair Rosina Hunnisett, Stuart Ralph Poppleton and Aquil Raees.
Bizarrely, both businesses changed their names two days before the court hearing: Offset Printers Ltd is now called We Print Books Ltd; while Printed Books Ltd is now called High Quality Books Ltd.
Accounts are overdue at both businesses.
The shape-shifting print farming operations were also connected to the former Houseprint business, which went into liquidation in August 2016.
Hunnisett’s business associate Stuart John, whose full name is Neill Stuart Malcolm John, was not a director of either business.
He is currently listed as the sole director of Hardback Printer Ltd, a business incorporated in May this year, using the same address in Barry, Wales as Hunnisett.
Printers and buyers had issued repeated warnings about dealing with the struck-off businesses for failing to deliver full orders.
In March this year, a man called ‘Malcolm’ with an email address named 'Printing Press UK' messaged PrintWeek stating that the firm had “printed and delivered quite literally a million books since 1990”. He claimed the firm had made than £100,000 in refunds to customers due to the issues raised with the firm’s services that had been published in PrintWeek.
‘Malcolm’ had not responded to a request for comment at the time of writing.
The companies named above are in no way connected to to Hampshire-based The Printing Press Ltd; specialist letterpress printer and bindery Book Printers Ltd of Finedon, Northamptonshire; Crewe-based The Printing House Ltd; UKPrint.biz, which is a trading name of Ruby Giraffe Ltd of Manchester; or www.bookprintinguk.com which is run by Bonacia Ltd in Peterborough.
