BSA approval delays hit Van Elle’s full-year financial forecast

Lower activity levels and “widespread” Building Safety Act (BSA)-related delays are set to hit full-year turnover at Van Elle Holdings.

In a trading update this morning, the firm – ranked by Construction News as the UK’s second-largest ground engineering specialist – said it expected revenue of £134m for the year to 30 April 2025.

This would mark a 4 per cent fall from the £139.5m it reported the year before.

Van Elle said the full-year forecast reflected “challenging conditions” prevailing in the construction sector, although its order book increased compared with 30 April last year.

The firm cited “widespread delays to contract start dates” due to the ongoing impact of the “well-publicised” BSA gateway approval bottleneck.

“The start of several major contracts which were due to commence in the final quarter of FY25 [financial year 2025] have now been deferred into FY26, impacting the final quarter performance,” Van Elle added.

However, the firm said its order book increased by £6.4m year on year to reach £41.5m by 30 April – and Van Elle’s piling division also won a £10m deal in May.

Its interim results, released on 29 January, described a 4 per cent drop in revenue to £65.2m, while pre-tax profit fell by a quarter to £1.9m.

In a trading update in March, the firm said that activity “remained surpressed throughout January and February” because of BSA-related delays.

These delays primarily impacted trading for Van Elle’s subsidiary Rock & Alluvium, which focuses on high-rise residential schemes in London and South East England.

Van Elle said in March that it was involved in more than 40 projects that remained in the approvals process. It was expected most would begin construction in the firm’s 2026 financial year.

The firm envisaged underlying pre-tax profit of £3.5m in its latest trading update, down from the £4.2m it posted last year.

It said a “focus on cash management” and cost-reduction initiatives will help deliver a “strong operational performance”.

Last month, for instance, the company announced the sale of its HGV fleet in a £2.9m deal with WS Specialist Logistics Ltd.

Van Elle said net cash at 30 April totalled £1m, down from £5.5m on a year-by-year basis because of “investment for growth in capital equipment” and the acquisitions of Rock & Alluvium and Albion Drilling.

The firm’s current £8m funding facility still has £6.5m available for drawdown, it added, “providing significant liquidity headroom”.