Glenn Chester
29/01/2010 16:51
Mike Wilcox/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
cc: John Breeden/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
Subject: Notification of Suspension - Mr Michael Rudkin (Ibstock Post
Office 223 217)
Mike
As discussed, following irregularities revealed at an audit of Ibstock
branch today, I have issued Mr Mike Rudkin, Subpostmaster, with a
precautionary suspension. At audit the following concerns were identified:-
National Lottery monies owing to the Post Office were not being paid
into the Post Office from the retail side on a regular basis. At audit,
£2447.00 of National
lottery sales were outstanding. The Subpmr produced £3k of monies to
the auditor to correct this error.
2. BB stock unit was £4k down. The Subpmr stated that he had completed a
transfer of the £4k from EE to BB stock on Wednesday night but the money
had
‘unfortunately’ not been physically transferred into the stock unit.
The Subpmr states that this was due to ill health on Wednesday/Thursday.
The money was
produced by the Subpmr from the main official safe along with some
paperwork that he had found at the bottom of the safe. The auditing
officer suspects that
the £4k was introduced into the stock by the Subpmr but is unable to
prove this. It is interesting to note that the notes were to the value
£3860.00 and were
in a paper bag. This begs the question, why weren't the notes in
either EE stock or BB stock units?
The aforementioned audit had been requested after we received a number
confidential calls from staff members working at the branch, wishing to
raise their concerns over a number of irregular practices they believed
were occuring at the branch.
The first contact request came via the NBSC Helpline. This was made by
Ruth Store (member of staff) on 11.01.10. The e-mail message that we
received from the Helpline was as follows:-
TEL NUMBER LEFT GRO } COULD MR WILLIAMS CONTACT RUTH STORE SHE IS
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A MEMBER OF THE STAFF AT IBSTOCK PO 2232170 SHE AND THE OTHER 3 MEMBERS OF
STAFF WOULD LIKE A MEETING WITH HIM AS MR RUDKIN THE POSTMASTER IS MAKING
LSE CASH DECS.
Mrs Store requested to speak with Paul Williams (Contract Manager) who
dealt with the original disciplinary case involving Mr Rudkin and his
wife. As that case had been concluded from the contractual side, I rang
Mrs Store on either 14/15th January 2010 to introduce myself and discuss
her concerns. Mrs Store was concerned that approx £1350 of lottery monies
had not been paid into the counter from the retail side and that Mr Rudkin
was transferring sums of money between stock units when in fact no money
was actually being transferred. Mrs Store was concerned that Mr Rudkin was
doing this to conceal the true level of cash on hand and she was worried
that he was inflating the cash on hand to hide the shortage. As their
stock units were being used for this purpose, Mrs Store and the other
members of staff were extremely concerned that they could be implicated in
any wrong-doing should the branch be audited - hence the reason for taking
the difficult decision to raise their concerns with Post Office Ltd. I
informed Mrs Store that I took her concerns seriously and recognised that
it was not an easy decision on her part to contact the Post Office. I
informed her that I would make further enquiries into her concerns and
thanked her for raising them with me.
I received a second call from Susan Ball (staff member) on 19.01.10
(apologies telephone number not known). Mrs Ball re-iterated the concerns
put forward by Mrs Store, in that she believed the cash at the branch was
being inflated to cover a shortage and the lottery monies had not been
paid over. In addition to this, Mrs Ball informed me that the atmosphere
at the branch was taking its toll on the health of all the staff working
at the branch, with staff having trouble sleeping and being constantly
worried about the situation at the branch.
Subsequent enquiries were made with Glenys Devlin, Accounting Team in
Chesterfield to see if she could identify any areas of concern at the
branch. Nothing untoward was identified. However, noting the concerns of
the two staff members a special audit was requested on 20.01.10.
I received another call from Ruth Store on my mobile on 27.01.10 asking if
I could give her a call and up-date her on the latest situation. I spoke
with her on th 27.01.10 and she informed me that one of the stock units
was £4k short and there was approximately £2k of lottery monies
outstanding. Mrs Store informed me that she thought Mr Rudkin was in
financial difficulties, as she had seen a letter from a financing company
and was concerned that he was trying to secure the necessary finance to
make good the losses before the branch received it's Horizon on-line
migration visit - As part of the new installation of Horizon software, all
branches will have their cash holdings checked. Mrs Store again expressed
her concerns that the health of the staff at the branch was being adversly
affected and asked when some action was going to be taken. I informed her
that I had requested a special audit at the branch but could not disclose
the date of when that audit would be taking place. I again emphasised the
fact that I took her concerns seriously and thanked her for taking the
time to give me a call.
As the audit has only taken place today, I've not had chance to speak with
Mrs Store or Mrs Ball, as all the staff were sent home by Mr Rudkin. I am
therefore unable to confirm whether they will be prepared to sign a
statement confirming the aforementioned. Noting the previous
irregularities at this branch, I would have expected the branch to be run
perfectly. I am therefore very concerned with the findings reported at
audit today and noting the fact that two of the staff members have taken
the courageous step in reporting the Subpmr, I would be very grat
you could please give consideration to looking into this case further.
Many thanks.
Regards
Glenn
Glenn Chester
Contract Manager
Post Office Ltd - Network Directorate
Post Office Ltd, Contract Support Team, Upper Floors, The Markets DMB,
6-16 New York Street, Leeds, LS2 7DZ
: gienn.chesteri GRO
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