PlumbFirst calls in voluntary administrators as cost pressures hit profitability

Electrical and plumbing services provider PlumbFirst, a company that turns over $44 million a year, has been placed into voluntary administration with the owners citing rising materials costs as the reason for calling in the corporate doctors.

However, the group, which offers 24/7 trade services in Victoria and South Australia, will continue to operate as usual while the administrators look for a potential sale to pull the company back from the brink.

WLP Restructuring Partners’ Alan Walker and Glenn Livingstone were today appointed voluntary administrators to PlumbFirst and six of its related entities.

Walker says PlumbFirst is one of the largest plumbing and electrical contracting operations in Australia’s southeast, with a workforce of 170. The company also operates the ElecFirst business. 

“The decision to appoint administrators was made by the group’s directors after rising materials costs adversely impacted its financial performance,” Walker says.

The administrators have stressed that PlumbFirst will continue operating as normal while they seek ‘urgent expressions of interest from suitable parties to recapitalise or purchase the group and its assets’.

“We are confident that a process to sell or recapitalise the group can move ahead quickly with the objective to maximise recoveries for creditors and minimise disruption for staff and customers,” Walker says.

“We are already working closely with management, employees and other stakeholders to do everything we can to continue to trade the group on a business-as-usual basis while we seek viable options to secure its future."

The administrators tell Business News Australia that some of the business' social media profiles have been closed to 'manage and limit any possibility of inaccurate information circulating'.

The administrators also note that they are in the 'very early stages of the process', and that they are doing 'everything possible to achieve a positive outcome for all stakeholders'.

"More will be known once the expressions of interest campaign advances," the administrators say.

The first statutory meeting of creditors will be held on Monday 24 April 2023.