A wedding dress company which was registered in the UK but operating from China and the US has been wound up in High Court following an Insolvency Service investigation which found it had filed misleading accounts and given false trading addresses to customers.

Edresses Global UK Co Ltd made wedding, party and prom dresses in China and marketed them on a large number of websites targeted at customers in the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Australia. Many of these websites indicated the company was trading in the UK from either Portsmouth or Park Royal in North London, and returns for refunds for faulty goods could be made there.

The High Court heard that Edresses lacked any presence in its purported addresses in the UK, failed to respond to any correspondence during the Insolvency Service investigation, and had filed misleading accounts.

Despite apparent substantial trading throughout 2012 as indicated by a Facebook campaign set up to complain about its activities, Edresses filed dormant accounts as a non-trading company for the period ending 30 November 2012. Edresses failed to produce any accounting records during the investigation.

The Facebook campaign was set up with 546 members, many of whom had faced 'excessively long' waits for their orders or not received the dresses, according to court evidence. These members had traded with the company through its websites and were able to communicate with company employees through a 'live chat' who confirmed that customers were dealing with Edresses and that the return address for faulty garments was in Park Royal.

Edresses's current director is Tao Zhang, whose address is in San Francisco and its former director is Wei Pang, whose address is in Shanghai City. The company also failed to co-operate with the investigation, with letters to the directors in China and the US, e-mails and 'live chat' messages all going unanswered.

David Hill, an Insolvency Service investigations supervisor, said: 'Edresses took advantage of people looking for dresses for important and significant occasions in their lives but rarely delivered the goods, and winding it up protects the public from losing more money in this way.'