Earlier this week, SemGroup Energy Partners LP confirmed to the SEC that it “was unable to file, without unreasonable effort and expense,” its form 10Q for the quarter ending Sept. 30. The report was due by Tuesday.

SemGroup Energy Partners, also known as SGLP, blamed the delay on a Nov. 5 request by hedge fund Manchester Securities for reimbursement of $1.3 million in expenses. No other details about the requested expenses were given except that Manchester claimed they “were incurred for the benefit of the partnership” and, for that reason, reimbursable.

“The partnership is unable to determine fully at this time and is continuing to evaluate what impact such reimbursement request will have on its financial statements,” the SEC filing reads.

The SemGroup entity was delisted from the Nasdaq exchange earlier this year after missing every reporting deadline since May 2008. The company, however, had begun filing again and caught up on quarterly reports by August.

SGLP spokesman Brian Cropper could not be reached for comment Thursday afternoon. SGLP units currently are traded on the “Pink Sheets” electronic market.

SGLP was in credit default ever since parent SemGroup LP’s bankruptcy filing in July 2008 but received a two-year credit waiver from senior lenders earlier this year, allowing it to borrow again.

Manchester Securities, along with hedge fund Alerian Capital Management, gained control of SGLP’s general partner interest when the parent SemGroup defaulted on a $150 million loan around the time of the bankruptcy, according to reports. The move essentially separated SGLP from SemGroup LP’s control.

Last month, however, SGLP announced that Manchester was selling all of its general partner interest to Vitol Inc. for an undisclosed sum. The public SemGroup earlier announced that it might change its name later this year.

Privately held SemGroup LP spun off some of its pipeline, oil and asphalt terminaling and transportation assets to form SGLP in 2007. The new company was taken public in July 2007, almost exactly one year before the parent’s bankruptcy.

SemGroup LP’s cash-flow collapse, partially due to mounting margin calls on failed oil futures trades, pushed it into bankruptcy. The public SGLP avoided its own Chapter 11 petition but had to find third-party asphalt storage customers to make up for the millions in revenue lost from moving oil and asphalt for the parent SemGroup.

The SemGroup subsidiary also is defending a class-action lawsuit related to the collapse of its parent company.

Fortunately for SGLP, third-party contracts jumped to 81 percent of second-quarter revenues this year. The overall quarterly revenues, however, fell about $16 million, to $79 million, compared with the three-month period ending July 31, 2008.

SemGroup LP, meanwhile, is hoping to emerge from Chapter 11 as a smaller, publicly traded entity focused on crude oil storage and transportation, company officials have said. The parent company’s reorganization plan has court and creditor approval, and the company could emerge from bankruptcy protection by next week.