What happened ?

On 2 April 2026, the North Holland sub-district court in Zaanstad held two indirect directors personally liable after Tuinmaterialen.nl BV took customer deposits for garden projects it did not deliver.The company grew quickly and relied heavily on supplier credit. 

It needed €500,000 in working capital. From April 2024, it stopped paying rent. It raised customer down payments from 40% to 50%. 

It even offered discounts for full prepayment. The court found that from 1 June 2024, the business should have stopped accepting new orders.

Most claimants won. The directors were ordered jointly and severally to repay customer losses of about €30,098.72 plus statutory interest and €2,752.47 in legal costs. One claim failed because that contract was signed before the court’s cutoff date.

Analysis

This case highlights a key risk: taking new orders after knowing the business model is no longer sustainable.

The court’s signal is operationally important for small businesses: growth does not protect you when your cash cycle, supplier dependence, and delivery capacity are already broken. Here, deposits became a survival tool rather than a funding source for projects. That changed the legal risk for management.

The weak point was not only finance. It was also a judgment. The directors kept selling while financing was uncertain. Supplier credit was tightening. Orders were apparently not even being placed for new customers. 

Many small firms wrongly assume they are safe as long as they are trading. This ruling shows the opposite.

Governance

Leadership failed to impose a stop signal. The directors treated continued sales as a rescue strategy. They made this decision instead of demanding hard evidence of deliverability. Oversight was too informal. Escalation came too late. Commercial momentum overruled operational reality.

Risk

The exposure was immediate: personal liability for directors, repayment of deposits, legal costs, loss of buyer trust, and collapse of continuity. For small businesses, accepting prepayments when delivery capacity is uncertain can turn a company crisis into a personal crisis for management.

Compliance

The ignored duty was simple: do not contract when you should know the business cannot perform or compensate the customer. The documentation gap also mattered. If you cannot prove orders, financing, and delivery capacity, your optimism has little defensive value.

Daily operational takeaway

Review every active order funded by deposits. If delivery depends on uncertain supplier credit or hoped-for financing, stop new sales now and document a board-level go/no-go decision within 72 hours.