CORPORATE financier Amin Amiri has paid £28,000 to buy back some of the assets of Speke training firm PFL which left behind debts of £2.2m.

Mr Amiri acquired PFL’s business names and intellectual property for £18,000 as a deemed distribution related to monies owed and £10,000 for assorted assets. Training schemes are no longer being operated by his companies from Speke with the purchase of assets relating to enabling the completion of a small number of ongoing courses.

Mr Amiri said he put in a "substantial" amount to money as a result of the troubles at the training business. PFL was put into administration by Mr Amiri last March just seven months after he had acquired the firm after it ran out of cash, defaulting on tax and salaries.

Joint administrators Stephen Clancy and David Whitehouse, directors of insolvency specialist MCR, were appointed in March, but their comprehensive analysis of PFL’s finances is still ongoing.

In a progress report to creditors, the administrators said they have been hampered by “the company’s poor record keeping” as they have sought to establish PFL’s accurate financial position. PFL was originally the trading arm of the charity Partnership for Learning. Its share capital was bought for £1 by PFL Centre of Excellence (COE) in August, 2009. The deal included the assumption of £1.34m of debt, which related to unpaid rent.

COE – 80% owned by Mr Amiri – was owed £1.33m when PFL collapsed. HM Revenue & Customs lost £184,000. The largest trade creditors were St Helens College, which operated a European Social Fund contract with PFL and was owed £251,000, and caterer Sodexo which lost £161,000.

The administrators said “it was not expected” there would be funds to pay non-preferential creditors.

When PFL collapsed, the administrators granted a licence to a specially-created vehicle, E&YS (Liverpool), a subisidiary of a business controlled by Mr Amiri.

Education and Youth Services (E&YS) is an education and training firm with 26 branches. Its largest shareholder is Mr Amiri’s Manchester-based corporate finance firm a2e Venture Catalysts.

E&YS has since purchased some of PFL’s assets for £10,000. Also, COE bought PFL’s business names and intellectual property for £18,000, which was deducted from the amounts it was owed.

As a preferred creditor, COE should receive some payment because Jaguar Cars’ paid £143,000 into the administration in respect of outstanding debt, with another £46,000 from Jaguar subject to talks.

Although five employees have been retained by E&YS, 27 people were made redundant following PFL’s collapse.

PFL was founded to help train staff at Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), Novartis and Eli Lilly. Its purpose-built centre opposite JLR’s Halewood plant was opened in 2001 and funded by European Union grants, the Northwest Development Agency, Liverpool City Council and Knowsley Council. A decline in the training sector had caused trading difficulties since 2008, with management accounts for the year to July, 2009, showing an £837,000 loss on a £2.2m turnover. The first half of the 2010 financial year generated losses of £130,000 on sales of just below £1m.

The Partnership for Learning charity still owns the building on South Road, Speke which bears its name.