Ilhan Kekec, 36, who ran the Derwish Kebab restaurant inside the food court of the East Shopping Centre in Green Street, Forest Gate was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison in March 2024 after fraudulently securing the loan and attempting to dissolve his business without notifying creditors.
The loan, obtained by overstating his company’s turnover, was used to pay off personal debts.
Kekec, of Abbotts Drive, Waltham Abbey, Essex, will now have to repay the funds with interest or face an additional 18-month prison sentence.
The fraudster was ordered to repay a total of £37,426 within three months at a confiscation hearing at Isleworth Crown Court on December 20.
He will still be required to repay the loan even if his prison sentence is extended.
Kekec was also ordered to pay £15,900 in costs.
Alexander Grierson, head of asset recovery at the Insolvency Service, said: “Ilhan Kekec not only supplied false information to fraudulently acquire £30,000 in taxpayer funds at the start of the pandemic but then proceeded to use the loan to pay off personal debts.
“This was not how the loans were supposed to be used and Kekec himself declared in his application that he would use the money for the economic benefit of his business.
“Securing this confiscation order is important as it means Kekec must pay this money back in full or spend even longer in prison.”
Kekec falsely claimed the turnover of his business, Hizirali Ltd, was £125,000 when applying for the Bounce Back Loan in May 2020.
Hizirali was set up by Kekec to run the Derwish Kebab restaurant.
Kekec had traded for three years through another company, Helosh Limited, as the Derwish Restaurant in St Albans Road, Watford, before opening this second restaurant.
However, his new venture only traded for three weeks before the Covid lockdown, and he was unable to open during that period.
Kekec withdrew the Bounce Back Loan money in cash and later admitted to Insolvency Service investigators that he spent the funds on clearing personal debts.
He applied to dissolve his company in June 2020, claiming it was no longer economically viable for him to run the restaurant.
However, he deliberately failed in his statutory duty to inform his creditors within seven days of his voluntary strike-off application with Companies House.
Kekec was also banned as a company director for three years when he was sentenced for his offences earlier in the year.
He was sentenced for two counts of fraud by false representation, contrary to section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006, and two counts of failure of notification of a voluntary strike-off application to creditors, within the seven-day statutory period contrary to section 1006(1) of the Companies Act 2006.
