  We present the first detailed X-ray analysis of three AGN, the Seyfert 1
galaxies UGC 3142 and ESO 140-43, and the Seyfert 2 galaxy ESO 383-18, in order
to study the geometry and the physical characteristics of their absorbers. High
quality XMM-Newton EPIC and RGS data were analysed, as well as Swift/XRT and
BAT and INTEGRAL IBIS/ISGRI data, in order to cover the 0.3--110 keV energy
range. For ESO 140-43 also XMM-Newton/OM and Swift/UVOT data were used. We
studied the variability of the three AGN on a time-scale of seconds using the
EPIC/PN light curves, and the long-term time-scale variability of ESO 140-43
using two observations performed 6 months apart by XMM-Newton. The spectra of
the three Seyfert galaxies present a "soft excess'' at energies E < 2 keV above
a power-law continuum that can be modeled by complex absorption, without any
additional emission component. The X-ray sources in UGC 3142 and ESO 383-18 are
absorbed by two layers of neutral material, with covering fractions f_1=0.92
and f_2=0.57 for UGC 3142, and f_1=0.97 and f_2 = 0.86 for ESO 383-18. While
the clumpy absorber could be part of a disc wind or of the broad line region
for UGC 3142, in the case of ESO 383-18 a clumpy torus plus Compton thin dust
lanes are more likely. The spectra of ESO 140-43 can be well fitted using a
power law absorbed by three clumpy ionized absorbers with different covering
factors, column densities, and ionization parameters, likely part of a moving
clumpy system, which might be a disc wind or the broad line region. The strong
spectral and flux variability on a time scale of 6 months seen in ESO 140-43 is
likely due to changes in the moving absorbers. The variation of the covering
factor of one of the three ionized absorbers could be detected, on a
kilo-seconds time-scale, in the EPIC light-curve of ESO 140-43.
