VG Mathers Limited, based in Kintore, Aberdeenshire, has entered liquidation after 58 years in business. Michael Reid, head of insolvency services in Scotland at MHA, has been appointed liquidator.
The company was established in 1968 by Vic Mathers and was later run by his son Colin. Alongside general haulage, it provided vehicle inspection and repair services.
Announcing the closure, Colin Mathers said the business had been hit by a combination of fuel, insurance, compliance and vehicle-maintenance costs, while pressure on cash flow left it increasingly vulnerable to late customer payments and changes in demand.
“We fought hard to absorb these costs, but the compounding pressure severely choked our cash flow,” he said. “Without the financial cushion to withstand any payment issues or fluctuating customer demand, we reached a point where continuing to trade became impossible.”
Cash fell from £291,000 to £72,000
VG Mathers’ latest published financial statements offer some context for those comments.
Accounts for the year ending 31 July 2025, filed at Companies House in April this year, show that the company’s cash balance had fallen from £290,868 to £72,109 in the space of 12 months – a decline of around 75%.
At the same time, the business reported £376,795 owed by customers, while £204,142 was owed to suppliers.
Its balance sheet therefore presents a more complicated picture than that of a business which had simply run out of assets. Total assets stood at £893,915 and reported net assets at £371,074 at the end of July 2025, up from £335,401 a year earlier. However, total liabilities had also risen from £700,721 to just over £1.02 million.
The figures are more than a year old and cannot show the company’s financial position immediately before liquidation. Nevertheless, the steep reduction in cash and the substantial sum tied up in customer receivables are consistent with Mathers’ description of a business increasingly exposed to cash-flow disruption.
The accounts also recorded an average of 13 employees during the 2024/25 financial year. MHA says seven jobs have now been lost with the closure, indicating that the workforce had become smaller by the time trading ceased.
New finance arrangement months before closure
Companies House filings provide another indication of the company’s working-capital arrangements.
On 17 February 2026, a Bank of Scotland charge dating back to 1994 was recorded as satisfied. Ten days later, on 27 February, VG Mathers granted a new floating charge over its assets to Sallyport Commercial Finance Limited, with the charge registered at Companies House on 3 March.
Sallyport provides invoice-finance and working-capital services, which allow businesses to access funds against invoices before customers have paid them.
The arrangement should not in itself be interpreted as evidence that VG Mathers was already insolvent: invoice finance is commonly used by transport businesses dealing with long customer payment terms. However, its timing provides additional context alongside the company’s falling cash reserves and Mathers’ subsequent comments about payment problems and inadequate financial headroom.
Haulage failures remain well above pre-pandemic levels
Mathers described VG Mathers’ demise as part of a much wider problem facing road transport, pointing to around 400 road haulage and freight companies closing during 2025.
Detailed Insolvency Service-derived figures for England and Wales show 407 insolvencies among road haulage and removals businesses in 2025. That was actually lower than the 472 recorded in 2024 and the 501 seen in 2023, meaning the number of failures has been easing rather than accelerating.
Nevertheless, the level remains substantially higher than before the pandemic. There were 282 insolvencies in the same sector in 2019, making the 2025 figure around 44% higher.
The downward movement has continued this year. There were 184 insolvencies among road haulage and removals businesses in England and Wales during the first six months of 2026, compared with 220 in the same period last year. The rolling 12-month figure to June stood at 371, against 427 in the preceding 12 months.
Those statistics do not include VG Mathers, which is registered in Scotland, but they illustrate the wider financial environment in which smaller UK transport operators are trading: insolvencies have retreated from their recent peak but remain markedly above pre-pandemic levels.
For VG Mathers, the combination ultimately proved unsustainable.
“In this industry, we are used to navigating tough times, but recently it has felt like one thing after another,” Mathers said, thanking the company’s staff, drivers and customers as he announced the closure.
Liquidator Michael Reid said VG Mathers was another example of a company facing significant pressures and said MHA’s priority would be to work with stakeholders to manage the winding-up process as smoothly as possible.
