My post referred to clubs who can pull in 5K+, not that we need another huge club. Even as an average mid-table side, Bradford are good enough to pull in 8K a week. Cas won't get 10K a week. Not because they aren't good enough, but because they are a club that thrives on good local followers, but the size of the town limits it (although I know there are towns like Pontefract and Selby that contribute).

Of the others in the league, we know HKR are good for over 5,000, as are Bradford. Quite possibly Halifax, and they are certainly good enough to match us in support. Probably not with Fev, again purely down to the size of the town.

Although I'm not sure we would get the same level of assistance, I don't think that's a good enough reason for the Bulls to sink out of trace.

This for me.

What I find particulary annoying is that like many others I pay my taxes, I presume this is not the case with Bradford following the demise of the Bulls. We would all like to start debt free by walking away from what we owe but to then be allowed just to start again. Why should they lose any players because how much have they wiped off by this action. I am not surprised that they are now considered a much better gamble for investors.
I fear that the tax office will not take this too well and the whole of RL could suffer if they feel it necessary. I believe most clubs have agreements with the tax office regarding deferred payments which I presume the inland revenue could look to remove should they wish to do so.

Agree, it's all a sad sorry affair.

Here is an idea towards the RFL to try to safeguard this happening to other clubs.

The RFL carry out regular Experian credit checks against each club.

Although nobody can really predict the future, what can be achieved is looking for trends to see if their ctedit rating is improving.

What can also be done via this is to recieve notifications on each company if something major happens such as a CCJ.

The RFL could then investigate that with the club concerned and carry out a full review of that clubs finances.

I think that this would see an end to just about all professional sport.

Can't really see how it would put an end to all sport to be fair.

If an alert gets sent over, if a CCJ has been logged, or a credit risk score has been reduced, the RFL could look into this, and try to work with the club, and work them through it. Also, this could work the other way too, if clubs credit check their sponsors and partners etc the same way.

Had this have happened, would Wakefield quite have been in the same position in 2012-13, had they been aware of Eric France's plight, as it would have shown the credit score dropping.

There is is saying that prevention is cheaper than the cure.

And how would an Experian check on Wakefield have revealed Eric France's plight? You would need to do credit checks on every club, every board member and possibly many employees and that still wouldn't detect any financial obfuscation being stored up for future disasters.

I use Experian all the time in the job I currently do, as a Credit Control team leader.

You can sign up to receive notifications to alert you if the credit score has dropped.

One of the tell tale signs of a company struggling, or starting to go pop, is when the credit risk score starts to drop. I would imagine that this happened to them prior to them going into administration.

Had they have known beforehand that they were on the way, maybe the club could have acted sooner.

That is what I meant, for the RFL to do say half yearly checks on each club, and then any extra checks should a risk alert come through, and maybe the same with clubs, with any major sponsor or partner.

You wouldn't necessarily need to do one for board members, and certainly not employees

It's not a bad idea Eastern and I'd be surprised if the RFL didn't have some contact through the credit agencies but the problem is as said above, you'd have to have access to all sponsors and investors too.
As an example, we were in trouble when Eric France had a problem. The day before they couldn't give us the sponsorship they promised we would have had a good credit reference, the day after we would not (assuming they can even track at that level). There would be no preparation through credit check to see that coming unless you were looking at Eric France and not Wakefield Trinity.

The club will probably be sold for a quid.
I think they should be known at the Bradford Pounders.
Look at getting pound land to sponsor them at a quid a game and charge the supporters a pound to get in.
Know that would be worthwhile calling them the peoples club.

That is really what I was thinking Pop Tart, for the RFL to do the in house checks on the club, and the clubs to do the in house checks on sponsors etc.

The conpany I work for carry out credit checks on all customers, regarding the cedit limit request is £1k, or £100k.

If you have a main sponsor, which is worth say £150-200k, it would be very wise running a credit report. If the account has a guarantor, then you can then also do land registry searches, to see if the guarantor owns a property.

We get emails on a daily basis, showing if any customers credit risk score has dropped, or whether any recent CCJ's has been logged, which we act upon. For example had Eric France had been monitored, we could have seen maybe the credit score dropping, and then maybe canvassed for a new sponsor as the 2012 season was coming to a close. When we get one of these alerts, we generate a new up to date credit report too.