Can see Leeds, Warrington and Wigan fighting it out for Bateman.

5th April is unlikely to have any relevance as a date to any tax payment deadline.

Pretty much this. i said i wouldn't but how can you not?

And at the same time I'm not a fscking mug and feel like I will prove to be if I do it.

There was apparently a piece on talksport today with Eddie Hemmings who suggested the IR was one of those requiring money for image rights or offshore tax - I hope it isn't - The IR are far less tolerant these days.

Why would anyone bid before they needed to.

Clubs would bid based on salary cap. Bateman too, if he went to the club who offered the biggest transfer it may not be the club that could offer the highest wage.



The club could put out a statement that any reasonable offers for any player would be taken into consideration, but the problem with a firesale after the end has already been announced is that people will wait it out before buying unessasarily.

I'm an accountant mate.

We know there is an image rights etc liability to pay. They'll tell you on here I have been going on about this [iad nauseum[/i for years. When I asked Hood at the last forum (written question) he clarified a statement he made at the previous forum, saying that the framework for settlements had been agreed between the RFL and HMRC, but that HMRC had not yet got to Bradford to determine and crystalise our liability.

That was January, so they may well have done so since.

My point though is that the end of the tax year has no relevance as a normal tax payment date. So unless there is a huge coincidence, I'd not read anything into tghe significance of the date itself.

Incidentally, its not so long ago that the club was assuring us that we were not exposed under the HMRC investigations into image rights, EBTS etc. Ho hum.

Same here. I'll end up pledging I know I will but I'm going to hang fire and do it next week when I've heard a bit more.

They really need to come clean about what's going on and more importantly what happens next.

I'm pledging now. I don't have much faith in Hood anymore, and I feel like a mug for doing it but I don't think there are many other realistic options due to the timescale.

Can't bear to think of the consequences if I don't.

I just hope the directors havent made an asset vanish just before the poop hits the fan. That would be naughty, and would be reversed.

The Bulls don't own the ground - the council still does. The long term lease has changed hands - allegedly for £1.2m on another thread.

The only relevance this has to tax is if they have substantial amount of Pay As You Earn tax due to HM Revenue & Customs which should of been paid for tax and national insurance deducted from all employees throughout the tax year



But then on that note the end of year certificate does not have to be in to HMRC until the 19th May which will show how much would be due if underpaid throughout the year.

If it was a disposal other than at market value, then a subsequent administrator might be able to recover further value from the parties involved. The usual trick is a company sells its property to the main shareholder at below market value just before it falls over...

Normally, its only fraudulent preferences (paying one creditor ahead of another for no good commercial reason) that can be reversed.

Adey from what little Hood has said, do you get any impression that the sudden urgency may be because the bank have called in an overdraft, or is it just me?

Also, I'd speculate that there isn't usually such massive pressure to a particular date; one reason (for example) why a debtor may have a pressing date to work to is if a creditor had perhaps served a Statutory Demand, and those have 18 days on them. Something had already happened in order to generate the mailshot, and it is 11 days to 6th April . . .

Good Luck on your survival. I was in the crowd at the crusaders last game and as a fan of RL I hope that doesn't happen to another club. I feel you may need to form a decent supporters group together and agree the way forward as fans joined, that may be telling hood to do one but united you stand and the fans of every other club will be behind you.

Indeed. Hood sort of suggested that.

But banks don't normally call in an overdraft unless there has been a breach of the facility agreement, or the facility has expired and they decline to renew it. More information, in this as in many aspects of all this, badly needed.

5th April just happens to be the last working day before Easter. I suspect the timing of Easter has as much bearing on it as anything.

Would the bank call in the overdraft due to us selling our biggest asset? the ground lease. Thus increasing our risk to them? Has solving one problem caused another?

That was precisely what I had been wondering.

Is it not that wages are due on the 14th, they want a few days to get cash into the bank to pay out, they are letting us know the pledge total on the 9th so the deadline is the 6th?

Why £500k though. The salary cap is maxed at £150k per month. The T&A quoted a much larger staff payroll though - up to about £200k total. Why do they need the other £300k?

Would we start to pay the RFL lease quarterly from April?
Do we owe someone else money? We seem to have paid our long term dues to the RFL & other clubs.
Winter wasn't that cold so it can't be the gas & leccy bill.
I just don't know.
We shelled out for the 5yr deal 6months ago so we have already advanced (effectively) an extra £800.
I could give them another £200 but want answers first. not just another bl00dy pledge!

The game needs a strong Bradford club and every attempt should be made to ensure its survival. Another poster recalled the late great Trevor Foster who rallied the fans to save the club in 1963. I remember that occassion and suggest a new figure head should be now be found and fast. With the internet and rugby web sites it should be easier to communicate with fans than back in Trevor's day.

If sufficient loyal fans can sign up to some sort of commitment, subject to a solution being found, then this could be presented to the RFL. But IMO any financial commitment should not be to pay off old debts run up by incompetent management. It should be used to support a new venture as shareholders who could perhaps buy the assets from the administrator. If you can get the media behind the campaign it could gain sufficient momentum to persude the RFL to allow the new club to take over the SL franchise. But time is short and what is needed is a steering committee whose first objective is to negotiate and buy time. Good luck

The bank has come out this not looking too bad.

Isn't RBS partly public owned? Surely its not in public interests to see a large top flight sports team completely disappear, baad for the economy and a city with not much going for it. Obviously they have the right to withdraw an overdraft facility but there hasn't been much discussed about why.

I keep wondering "What's to lose?". If they dont get the £500k then I dont have to pay. If they do then surely £500k should be enough to save the club and I would be happy to pay more than £100 to do that.

But the club say they need £1m. That seems mind boggling to me. How can a cash injection of £500k not be enough to save a club the size of the Bulls? And unless they can demonstrate how they can get from £500k to £1m I might just be throwing my money away.

It comes down to an issue of trust. Without a lot more info from the Board I cant bring myself to do it.

To be fair, it's not the Bank's job to fund failing sports teams.

If a bust taxpayer owned Bank took it upon itself to bankroll bust union clubs, I'm not sure we'd agree it was the best use of taxpayer cash.

As I said on the VT, we don't know what the "urgency" is - I'm sure the Bank will have issued the Bulls board with more than one ultimatum, they won't have just woken up one day and decided to cut their working cap facility and screw the club.

The "urgency" could very well be entirely of the Bulls' making, if they haven't addressed the Bank's concerns adequately over time and if brinksmanship has led to this current plight. The Bank's concerns are likely to have been wholly legitimate too, given the perilous state of the club's finances.

I'd expect they're hoping to take alot on the gate and in the shop vs leeds to help out.

True, and well put.