‘Considerable risk’ if Post Office replaced Horizon system, says chairman

Group action

There is currently a group action against the Post Office where subpostmasters – supported by The Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance (JSFA) – seek justice and compensation for what they claim are wrongful prosecutions and fines.

The Criminal Cases Review Commission is also reviewing prosecutions for account shortfalls, which subpostmasters blamed on Horizon.

In response to previous Computer Weekly articles, the Post Office said: “It remains the case that more than three years of investigations have not identified any transaction caused by a technical fault in Horizon, which resulted in a postmaster wrongly being held responsible for a loss.”

As recently as May 2016, the Post Office apologised to subpostmasters when branches all over the UK were unable to operate for an hour and a half on 9 May 2016. This was the result of a problem with the Horizon computer system. Problems such as this can cause account shortfalls, according to campaigners.

For example, in November 2015, the Communication Workers Union subpostmasters branch CWU said in a case documented by investigators that a core branch transferred cash to an outreach branch and Horizon reduced the accounts of the core by the amount transferred.

The outreach branch transferred in the amount sent and Horizon accepted the correct amount. However, Horizon did this four times, causing a loss of three times the actual amount sent. The discrepancy was for money that did not exist.

In relation to this, Post Office IT support sent an email to a member of the postmasters’ branch of the CWU revealing the flaw. The email said Post Office IT support planned to fix the glitch “with a code change”.

Reports into Horizon dispute

The Horizon dispute has moved beyond the computer system itself and is more about how The Post Office dealt with the claims of subpostmasters that the losses they incurred were down to the system rather than misaccounting or theft.

An independent report into the Horizon system and individual subpostmaster cases by forensic investigation company Second Sight, which was commissioned by the Post Office and published in April 2015, said the Post Office was too quick to go to court in some cases of subpostmaster account shortfalls.

“As a result of our investigations, we have established that Post Office’s investigators have, in many cases, failed to identify the underlying root cause of shortfalls prior to the initiation of civil recovery action or criminal proceedings,” said Second Sight.

But in its own 83-page report, the Post Office said the Second Sight findings were wrong.

Alan Bates, who set up the Justice for subpostmasters Alliance (JFSA) pressure group, said: “This case is about the failure of the Post Office to identify the problems with the system and the fact that they held subpostmasters responsible for shortfalls.”

He also claimed the Post Office has “failed to invest in the system to make life easier for subpostmasters”.