A NIGHTCLUB set to offer drinking until 6am in Old Town has run into trouble before even opening – after it emerged another company is already using the same name.

Tiger Bills has been contacted by a chain that owns two restaurants offering American and Thai cuisine under the slogan, ‘bar, wok, grill’.

The nightspot is set to open in the former Studio club, in Hoopers Place, this spring.

The 8,000 sq ft venue, which has already coined the slogan ‘what Bill says, goes’, will offer a number of bars, a VIP mezzanine and a garden area.

But the owners of the Tiger Bills restaurants in Exeter and Torquay are understood to have approached the nightclub’s management to tell them to stop using the name.

A spokeswoman for the Lifestyle Hospitality Group Ltd, which runs venues across the south west, confirmed that it was aware of the situation.

“This nightclub is nothing to do with us and we have been in correspondence with them over the use of the Tiger Bills name,” she said.

“We are a completely separate entity. Other than that all I can say is watch this space.”

No one at the proposed nightclub – which is currently running a weekly competition at nearby Baker Street bar to find a resident DJ – was available for comment.

The letting and managing agent for the building’s landlord, Stephen Brickell, of Kilpatrick and Co Property Consultants, welcomed news of the opening earlier this month.

He said: “I am delighted to have secured such an established and forward thinking operator for this landmark building.

“The landlords and I are delighted with the plans for the venue and are sure that it will set new standards for the leisure industry and will be bringing to Old Town an unrivalled night time experience and rejuvenate the regional leisure circuit.”

The building has been largely empty since Studio – which had replaced Mission nightclub – closed in 2005.

Concerns have been raised about safety surrounding the club after The Spot bar, which is directly opposite Tiger Bills, had its licence reviewed over incidents of assaults on police, brawls and drunkenness.

But the 6am licence still stands from the Studio days and cannot be reviewed unless it is proven that Tiger Bills is breaching its obligations – which can only happen once the club is up and running.

A blurb on the new nightclub’s Facebook page says Tiger Bills will be known as ‘Bills’ to clubbers and ‘will have nothing less but sharp service and only a premium range of drinks surpassed by a music experience not seen or heard for at least a decade’.

The description also promises: “Beneath the shell of the building will be a fury of exotic and intimate décor with a sound and light experience which will self entangle and grasp the very organ which draws every breath.”

In a comment on the page, the venue has said it will be ‘independently owned and managed’ and will reveal all its plans online ‘once we’re ready’.