Some Kitchen House customers will lose deposits

Kitchen House has a history of financial troubles. File photo / Steven McNicholl

Some Kitchen House customers who made deposits with the retailer before its collapse will find themselves out of pocket, the firm's receiver says.

The company - which has six retail sites around the North Island, three of them in Auckland - went into receivership last week, owing $2.4 million.

Receiver Grant Graham of KordaMentha said about 20 customers were affected. Thirty-five Kitchen House staff have also lost their jobs.

A number of concerned Kitchen House customers who have made deposits and not received their goods have contacted the Business Herald since the retailer's collapse.

Graham said the receivers were working with affected customers on a case-by-case basis.

In some cases kitchens were "well advanced" and would be completed.

"But there will definitely be some who will be out of pocket," Graham said. "They will have a claim against the company because they have advanced sums [money] ahead of production."

Kitchen House was owned by Auckland-based furniture maker Criterion Group, which went into receivership at the end of January, reportedly owing $11 million. About 180 Criterion staff members have been out of a job since its collapse and have not received any redundancy pay.

Graham said his prime focus was selling Criterion and Kitchen House as going concerns, and also seeing how much cash could be generated from selling plant and equipment. Kitchen House had a plant located within Criterion's facilities in East Tamaki.

Graham said that whether staff of the two businesses received outstanding wages would depend on how much cash was raised from selling stock and how much was money was received from debtors.

"Over the next two to three weeks we'll have a pretty good handle on what we're likely to recover."

Kitchen House last went into receivership in February 2009. Criterion announced in April 2009 that it had acquired Kitchen House for an undisclosed sum.