Syzmon Jastrzebski, 24, from Luton, was director of a company called E Marketing, set up in 2019, and was the sole director with no staff.

He has been given a 13-year director ban and has been ordered to pay costs of £3,566 for abuse of the covid scheme. This means he will not be able to set up a new business or act as a director until 2037.

As soon as the pandemic started, Jastrzebski, who was only 20 years old at the time, applied for two separate bounce back loans totalling £100,000, using his business to claim the two £50,000 covid loans without any records of his earnings as he had never filed any accounts.

Unsurprisingly within weeks of receiving the loans from two separate banks, HSBC and NatWest Bank, the business went bust in June 2020 with none of the £100,000 in loans repaid.

Jastrzebski hid the existence of one of the covid loans from the insolvency practitioner, McAlister & Co, when his company went into liquidation, which only came to light during investigations into his conduct by the Insolvency Service.

Fortunately, the collapse of E Marketing triggered an investigation by the Insolvency Service, which revealed the second bounce back loan from NatWest.

E Marketing also failed to maintain adequate accounting records from its incorporation in October 2019 until liquidation.

The Insolvency Service also identified payments of more than £500,000 to third parties between March 2020 and June 2021, but these were also not explained by Jastrzebski.

Jastrzebski did not contest the proceedings and was not present at the final disqualification hearing.

The lack of checks on applicants for the loans led to widespread fraud as people could get away with making up earnings and received money within days without any proof that they were entitled to loans.

Kevin Read, chief investigator at the Insolvency Service, said: ‘Syzmon Jastrzebski applied for two bounce back loans when the rules of the scheme were very clear that only one application could be made for an individual business.

‘He compounded this by failing to disclose the existence of the first loan he secured when his company went into liquidation.

‘Tackling bounce back loan misconduct is a key priority for the Insolvency Service. The 13-year disqualification order reflects the serious nature of the breach of acceptable behaviour for any company director by Jastrzebski and means he cannot be involved in the promotion, formation or management of a company in the UK for that period.’

Jastrzebski was handed the disqualification order at Bristol Business and Property Court on 26 March and the director ban started on 16 April.