EFFORTS by the Society of St Vincent de Paul yesterday to ascertain whether £185,000 it had invested through Taylor Asset Managers was recoverable, have met with no success.

The society has been unable to ascertain whether any cover or protection exists for its investment.

A request by it last week to the company that the sum be returned was turned down. The charity was told the money could not be traced, according to sources.

The sum was part of a £0.5 million bequest which the society was using for the development of the Sunshine House holiday centre for underprivileged children, in Balbriggan, Co Dublin.

It was specifically earmarked for an indoor playing facility, the building of which has been put on hold.

Some £200,000 of the bequest had already been spent on Sunshine House and the remainder of the bequest, which had been with Taylor Asset Managers, was withdrawn at an earlier date and is understood now to be under the society's control.

The charity's account was one of those which Mr Tony Taylor ordered should be deleted from the company's records. A total of £840,000 was included in a small number of files deleted from the company records.

The interim report from the authorised officer is believed to have found that details of four accounts opened in 1995 and two opened this year were also deleted. The sums involved in each account varied from £10,000 to over £200,000. The authorised officer has been unable to trace these investments.

A further sum of just over £700,000 was received from clients, but never entered into the computer system or the company's books. This amount may increase as further investors come forward.