The fallen telecoms retailer holds £168m of unsecured debts (of which £78m is owed to HMRC) and owes £450m to bondholders and banks. A progress report published by PwC will inform creditors of how much money they can expect to receive back, but many are already preparing for the worst – in November last year, the administrator warned that unsecured creditors would at best receive a mere 40 pence in every pound they were owed back.

Phones 4U collapsed unexpectedly in September last year, despite hitting sales of £1.16bn (and a pre-tax profit of £43.8m). PwC has also launched an investigation into the company’s closure, in conjunction with Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, to establish why Phones 4U collapsed so unexpectedly.

Phones 4U bonds currently trade at 33p on the pound; the bonds were issued four years ago by BC Partners, when the private equity group acquired the company for £677m.