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Press release

Noodle bar boss sentenced after ignoring company director ban and using false employment document

His wife was also sentenced for helping him defy his director ban

From:
The Insolvency Service
Published:
8 October 2026

  • Desmond Pheby continued running a noodle bar franchise company despite being disqualified as a director  

  • He used a false employment document which presented him as a £12-an-hour “Franchise Relationship Manager”  

  • Pheby was handed a suspended sentence and director ban until 2036

A noodle bar franchise boss who carried on running his business despite being disqualified as a company director has been sentenced and handed a fresh 10-year ban. 

Desmond Pheby, 57, continued managing Wok & Go Franchise UK Limited, which sold franchises for the Wok & Go noodle takeaway chain, despite an earlier seven-year director disqualification for failing to keep accounting records. 

He also used a false employment document in civil court proceedings which presented him as a £12-an-hour “Franchise Relationship Manager”. 

Pheby, of Harley Drive, Higher Kinnerton, Flintshire, North Wales, was sentenced at Chester Crown Court on Monday 5 October. 

He received 12 months in prison, suspended for two years, and was ordered to complete 200 hours of unpaid work. Pheby was also disqualified as a director for a further 10 years. 

His wife, Sharon Pheby, 51, of the same address, admitted aiding and abetting her husband to act in breach of his director disqualification. 

She was given a 12-month community order, ordered to complete 100 hours of unpaid work and disqualified as a director for five years. 

Confiscation proceedings under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 are ongoing.

David Snasdell, Chief Investigator at the Insolvency Service, said:

Desmond Pheby knew he was banned from running companies but continued managing his business regardless. 

His original ban followed serious failures over company accounting records, but rather than learn from that, he ignored the restrictions placed on him. 

He then used a false employment document in civil court proceedings where his role in the company was one of the issues in dispute.  

Director disqualifications protect the public and the business community. Those who ignore them risk prosecution and, as Pheby has discovered, being banned for even longer.

Desmond Pheby had accepted his original seven-year disqualification in July 2019 following the liquidation of T.P.F Limited, another food company he directed. 

He had failed to ensure the company maintained adequate accounting records or alternatively failed to preserve and deliver them up. 

The lack of records meant it was not possible to account for more than £200,000 in current assets shown in the company’s accounts or properly account for almost £800,000 of expenditure. 

Investigators were also unable to verify Pheby’s explanation for why the company failed or explain how its financial position deteriorated from net liabilities of £13,084 to a deficiency of £164,956 by the time it entered liquidation in September 2017. 

His seven-year ban began in July 2019 and should have prevented him from acting as a director or taking part in the promotion, formation or management of a company without permission from the court. 

But Pheby disregarded the ban, continuing to act in the management of Wok & Go Franchise UK Limited while disqualified. 

He pleaded guilty in August 2025 to acting in the management of the company in breach of his ban. 

Pheby was also prosecuted over a false employment document which was provided during civil court proceedings involving a franchisee’s claim for damages. 

The claim concerned a number of contractual disputes, including Pheby’s role within the company. 

A jury at Chester Crown Court unanimously convicted Pheby in August this year of using a false instrument with intent that it be accepted as genuine. 

Sharon Pheby’s guilty plea to aiding and abetting her husband was entered on the basis that she did not actively aid or abet him until 1 August 2020. 

During an interview under caution with Insolvency Service investigators, she said she discovered in August 2020 that she was registered as a director of around 18 companies when she had believed she was a director of only one. 

She told investigators her husband said he had “no choice” but to make her a director to keep the businesses running. 

In court, Desmond Pheby claimed he had stepped back into the company to protect it during Covid. 

However, an analysis of company bank accounts found that more than £170,000 was transferred to his personal accounts during 2020.

Further information