A COMPANY with a multi-million-pound arrangement to work on Bournemouth council’s housing stock has gone into administration.

The Kinetics Group – which traded locally from Bournemouth council premises and carried the council logo on its vans – employed 71 people in the town.

It carried out jobs such as electrical work, kitchen installations and adaptations of council housing to suit people with disabilities.

The council said it had an “implied contract” worth up to £3.7 million a year at its peak.

The council had been allowing Kinetics’ suppliers to send their invoices direct to the council since January after local companies found they were not getting paid on time.

Its jobs have been suspended while the council seeks to transfer the 71 jobs to Mouchel, the company which has already taken over the work of several council departments.

A statement from Gary Josey, Bournemouth council’s director of housing landlord and parks, said: “Bournemouth council’s maintenance contractor Kinetics ceased providing a service on Monday.

“Although works are currently stopped pending talks with the administrator, we hope to transfer all staff over to the council’s existing corporate facilities management incremental partner, Mouchel.

“Bournemouth council only had an implied contract with Kinetics and effectively took over the supply chain payments in January due to late payment issues for local suppliers.

“The overall value was originally up to £3.7m per annum, but this reduced as some works were taken back in-house and material costs deducted.

“This was a conscious effort by the council to protect the local supply chain and maintain works for our residents.

“The 71 locally-employed Kinetics trades staff provided a good service and they will continue to do so under new management.

“We apologise for any delay in service.”

Administrator Begbies Traynor said the group had “suffered from confusion regarding the solvency of subsidiary companies, delays in payments from key customers and from suppliers’ refusal to continue trading with it after its credit insurance cover was removed”.

The vast majority of staff nationally had been made redundant, with a small skeleton staff kept on to finalise the affairs of the group companies.

The administrator was working to transfer contracts to other providers where possible.