No Beddoe, no indemnity – Receiver shellacked

When a judge orders a receiver’s remuneration to be fixed in the amount of zilch, iNO knows there’s a yarn in the offing and in the matter of White Rook Pty Ltd v White Horizon Pty Ltd [2025] QSC 262 Vincents‘ director Nick Combis has all but written it for us.

“In short, the receiver’s claim was dismissed after counsel instructed by the receiver conceded that the receiver did not have standing to commence the proceeding”. Justice Rebecca Treston.

The tale goes back to 2011 when Combis and then Vincents director Peter Dinoris were appointed as receivers to the property of the Krystyna Allan Trust and the Ultimate Horizon Trust partnership.

In 2014 Combis commenced a proceeding in Queensland’s Magistrate’s Court to recover a debt owed to the partnership by one of its two members and in 2017 he commenced a recovery proceeding in the Queensland District Court against one of the two partnership trustees. The defendant in the District Court matter in turn filed a counter claim.

Incredibly it took eight years for the two proceedings to be heard together. That occurred in April of this year with a judge of the Supreme Court of Queensland finding in favour of Combis in respect of the proceeding he commenced in the Magistrate’s Court.

But Combis had an admission to make to the court in relation the District Court matter and reluctance does begin to describe how excruciating a mea culpa Combis confessed to.

“In short, the receiver’s claim was dismissed after counsel instructed by the receiver conceded that the receiver did not have standing to commence the proceeding,” Justice Rebecca Treston said in her October 17, 2025 ruling on Combis’s application for remuneration.

That’s right. Despite failing to first ensure he had standing to make the application in the District Court Combis chose to proceed, thereby incurring costs improperly.

Then, in the aftermath of his excoriating admission he still sought indemnification for his remuneration and disbursements, arguing that despite the lapse the amounts were properly incurred. Justice Treston wasn’t having it.

Cataloguing the prudent steps Combis never took her honour focussed especially on his failure to make a Beddoe application in circumstances where the decision to proceed was brought six years after the receivers’ appointment and five years after the assets of the partnership had been realised.

“In the circumstances, it seems to me that the failure to bring the Beddoe application was a failing which directly led to the bringing of a proceeding which would otherwise likely have been exposed as one without standing, prior to its commencement,” she said.

“That is not a conclusion that the proceeding was obviously misconceived, but it is a conclusion that the occasion for turning one’s mind to the prospects of success was before the proceeding commenced, not seven years after commencement and at the conclusion of a three day trial.”

Concluding that the expenses incurred in relation to the abandoned proceeding were improperly incurred the judge refused Combis’s plea for indemnification.

“In the exercise of my judgment, having concluded that the White Horizon litigation was not an expense which was “properly incurred”, it seems to me that there is no alternative other than to deny the receiver remuneration or disbursements in respect of that aspect of his claim.”