‘Absolute fool’: Prince Andrew embroiled in another debt battle, this time over £1.6m

The Duke of York has been branded an “absolute fool” after becoming embroiled in another £1.6 million debt battle.

The "business debt” is owed to a Swiss couple who are understood to have placed a freezing order on his Verbier ski chalet 18 months ago.

Isabelle de Rouvre - a French socialite who sold the chalet in 2014 to the Duke and Sarah, Duchess of York, but later sued them over an outstanding £6.7 million debt - said she pitied the Swiss pair caught up in the legal wrangling, knowing the stress she endured in recouping her money.

“It was a horrible experience,” she said. “I do not understand how he operates and I feel very sorry for people who are involved with him in business.”

The Duke’s latest debt came to light after proving a complicating factor in his ongoing sale of the chalet, called Helora, which has been in train for several months.

Removal vans from London firm Abels were seen at the property this week as the Duke, the Duchess of York and his daughters, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, began to move out their belongings, having visited for a final time over the new year.

Abels was the first removals firm to gain a Royal Warrant when it was awarded by the Queen in 1981.

A source close to the Duke told The Telegraph: “Talks are under way to resolve the matter. It in no way prevents the sale of the chalet, which is proceeding.”

Watch: Prince Andrew’s controversial chalet ‘being cleared out’

The Duke is said to be disputing the amount owed, but does not deny the unpaid debt.

Ms de Rouvre, whose own money was finally repaid last year, said the Duke and Duchess of York “are so crazy”, adding: “He is an absolute fool and I just cannot understand how he goes about his life.

“Really it is a tragedy and so bad for the Queen. I don’t know how she manages with them.

“I am lucky that a deal was made and it is the end of the matter for me. I am fed up with the whole thing.”

Ms de Rouvre sold Chalet Helora to the Yorks, then her friends, for £18 million.

She agreed that a final £5 million cash payment could be deferred for five years, until December 2019, with interest accruing.

However, the pair did not honour the agreement, despite repeated demands.

In recent years, both the Duke and the Duchess of York - with whom he still lives - have been dogged by criticism of their financial affairs that includes taking money from Jeffrey Epstein, the billionaire financier and convicted paedophile, and the sale of their former marital home for an inflated fee to the son-in-law of Kazakhstan’s autocratic former president.

In February, the Duke agreed to pay his sexual abuse accuser, Virginia Giuffre, around £12 million.

The Queen privately funded his legal fight to the tune of millions of pounds and is understood to have partly funded the settlement in order to allow her son - and the entire Royal family - to draw a line under the case that had threatened to overshadow her Platinum Jubilee year.

The Duke was also named in an ongoing High Court battle after being given more than a million pounds by an alleged Turkish fraudster.

The Duke and his former wife both received "suspicious" payments on the orders of Selman Turk, a former Goldman Sachs banker, as part of an international £40million fraud, it is alleged, and are caught up in a case over missing money. They repaid the money they had received.

Last year, The Telegraph revealed that the Duke was forced to abandon a secretive company set up with a disgraced former Coutts banker, after being advised that such financial structures were “not appropriate” for members of the Royal family.

The company - called Lincelles, after the 18th-century battle against the French in which the British were commanded by the Duke of York - was incorporated in summer 2020 to act as a trust fund for the Duke’s daughters.

It was structured as an unlimited company, meaning it would not be required to file accounts with Companies House and could avoid disclosing its profits or income.

The Duke of York controlled 75 per cent of the business through his Urramoor Trust. Harry Keogh - another friend and adviser, who was the subject of a sexual harassment probe at Coutts - was listed as a fellow controller.

The company was incorporated in the same month that the Duke and the Duchess put their ski chalet on the market.