Planning a business closure

A closure plan needs to connect customer work, people, premises, records and the assets that can become available for sale. Start by defining the scope and the decisions still needed. Then give each workstream an owner and a clear way to report changed facts.

These guides provide practical planning records. They do not determine the legal closure route, certify solvency or replace advice on employment, property or tax.

Scope, decisions and dates

• Write a clear scope for the business closure
• Keep a decision log during a closure
• Split a closure into work that can be owned
• Find the tasks that control the closure date
• Separate a planning target from a binding deadline
• Run a closure meeting that produces decisions
• What to check each week during a business wind-down

Costs, questions and coordination

• Build a closure budget without hiding assumptions
• Why sale receipts and closure bills may fall in different weeks
• Make a contingency list for the closure
• Give each unresolved closure risk a person to answer it
• Where should the working closure documents live?
• Managing a small closure without a project manager
• Track decisions that depend on people outside the business

Changes, responsibility and advice

• What to do when the closure plan changes
• Find the closure jobs everyone assumes someone else owns
• Which closure preparations can you make before deciding?
• In what order should you speak to closure advisers?
• Prepare a useful closure update for directors
• Keep a closure organised when the owner is elsewhere

Spending, handover and completion

• Who can approve spending while the business closes?
• Measure closure progress with completed outcomes
• Hand the closure plan to someone else
• The small unfinished task that prevents a clean exit
• Agree what finished means before closing the business
• A one-page closure plan for the first serious meeting

For the disposal workstream, UK Auction Group can discuss the asset scope and its business constraints.

Return to all closure topics.