Published: Wednesday, 28th July, 2010 4:35pm

26 creditors' meetings in Meath

New figures show a total of 330 creditors' meetings were held in the second quarter of the year, the equivalent of five companies for every working day in Q2.

ICC Information, part of the D&B Group, revealed that this is an increase of 44 per cent on the same period in 2009 and the highest number per quarter since the start of 2009.

According to their last filed accounts, these companies had creditors outstanding of a staggering €356 million.

Construction companies continued to lead the charge, accounting for 20 per cent of all creditors meetings held, followed by companies citing 'business activities' with 19 per cent. The huge strain being put on hotels and restaurants is also obvious, accounting for 11 per cent of all creditors meetings.

While Dublin companies continue to account for the majority of creditors' meetings with 54 per cent, there was a huge increase in the number of being held by Cork-based companies in comparison to Q1 this year. Laois was the only county which escaped without any creditors' meetings.

Meath saw 14 creditors' meetings in the second quarter of this year, with 12 having been held in Q1.

"These results reflect the significant challenges facing businesses and counties throughout Ireland, and a continued acceleration in the number of distressed companies across the economy," said Paula Carney, head of risk management solutions at D&B Ireland.

More worrying is the huge amounts of money that these companies owe to other companies, which essentially continues the cycle of debt default risk in the economy. "However, further analysis shows that there are early warning signs associated with these companies as, in many cases, they share several common indicators of failure risk. In fac,t of those companies that held creditors meetings in Quarter 2 2010, in 84 per cent of cases ICC advised an abnormal risk of failure and/or advised against extension of credit up to 12 months prior to the calling of a creditors meeting," she added.

"If companies want to survive and prosper in the current climate, it is essential that they pay much greater attention when making decisions to extend credit. This will greatly assist cashflow management and decrease their chance of incurring bad debt," she said.

ICC Information, a leading Irish authority on business insight and credit risk management, provides online access to credit risk information covering 100 per cent of all Irish limited and non-limited businesses and, as part of the D&B group, provides access to powerful intelligence on over 170 million businesses across the globe.