FUJ00154683
FUJ00154683
Peak Incident Management System
Call Reference PC0158102 Call Logger _Customer Call_ -- EDSC
Release Reported In -- T80 Top Ref 248887
Call Type Live Incidents Priority B -- Business restricted
Contact EDSC Call Status Closed -- Advice after Investigation
Target Date 09/05/2008 Effort (Man Days) 0
Summary Branch 141832 - Query from POL re BTS for periods 9 & 10 2007
Progress Narrative
pac
6-May-2008 14:38:02 User: Customer Call_
ALL PCO158102 opened
Details entered are:-
summary: This is a business incident for Claire Drake.
call Type:L
call Priority:B
ffarget Release: T80
Routed to:EDSC - _Unassigned_
Date/Time Raised: May 6 2008 2:28PM
Priority: B
contact Name: Jane Smith
contact Phone: GR
fo}
eiginator: XxXXXX@TESOT”~
riginator's reference: 248887
Product Serial No:
Product Site
POL FS
[this is a business incident for Claire Drake. The branch is 141832. The amount is £1888.73. The date is 12/07.
incident History:
2008-05-06 14:28:49 [ Scott, Andy]
INIT : create a new request/incident/problem/change/issue
o08-05-06 14:38:45 { Scott, Andy]
neut_en_rm : Transfer Notification
2008-05-06 14:39:46 [ Scott, Andy]
Jzneut_en_rm : Transfer Notification
2008-05-06 14:39:46 [ Scott, Andy]
TR : Transfer ‘group’ from ‘SMC1' to ‘PEAK!
Jdate: 06-May-2008 14:47:01 User:Lorraine Guiblin
product General/other/M Unknown General/Other/Misc (version unspecified) added.
Date:06-May-2008 14:47:15 Uscr:Lorraine Guiblin
the Call record has been transferred to the team: MSU-Indt Mgt
fhe Call record has been assigned to the Team Member: Claire Drake
progress was delivered to Provider
bate:15-May-2008 15:54:10 Uscr:Claire Drake
[Start of Response]
It have spoken to Mark Wardle at POL as I am unable to progress this call until I have the full information that is usually sent
lby Jane Smith when she logs the call.
[End of Response]
Response code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -
Incident Under Investigation
[Date:15-May-2008 16:09:44 Uscr:Claire Drake
[Start of Response]
s noted above, the information e-mail from Jane wasn't received. I have the following information from Andrew Winn at POL.
Please can the following be investigated:
le have discovered that Craigpark (141832) has a problem in their POLFS discrepancy account. The branch's trading statements for
periods 9 & 10
2007 show a figure of £1,888.73, whereas i believe this should always be zero.
It am particularly concerned, not so much that Fujitsu have not identified this branch (on my records), but because the branch has
lexperienced significant discrepancies at each branch trading from period 10 up to the last branch trading on 1/5/08 (but no
levidence of recent losses prior to that). The net branch debt now stands at nearly £24K and the subpostmaster is now desperate -
land questioning the integrity of Horizon.
FUJ00154683
FUJ00154683
fas a matter of urgency we need to establish if the branch has experienced a similar problem to others we are aware of, following
the EPOSS software load. We also need to understand if, unlike other branches (as far as we are aware), the subsequent losses
have been generated, in part or full, by the Horizon functionality.
lA request for investigation has already been raised last week by Jane Smith. She is now on leave, It may be Claire Drake who is
er Fujitsu contact. This was simply a standard enquiry at the time, but we are now potentially looking at branch closure if we
cannot resolve swiftly.
Forwarding call to EDSC for investigation.
[End of Response]
esponse code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
Joate:15-May-2008 16:10:45 User:Claire Drake
[the call summary has been changed from:—
this is a business incident for Claire Drake.
the call summary is now
ranch 141832 - Query from POL re BTS for periods 9 & 10 2007
Joate:15-May-2008 1
[Start of Response]
initial BIMs issued to POL,
[End of Response]
Response code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
4:17 User:Glaire Drake
Jbate:15-May-2008 16:14:33 Uscr:Claire Drake
IThe Call record has been transferred to the team: EDSC
progress was delivered to Provider
[Date:15-May-2008 16:28:45 User:Anne Chambers
Ihe Call record has been assigned to the Team Member: Anne Chambers
Progress was delivered to Provider
[Date 16-May-2008 0:
[Start of Response]
interim response emailed to Claire Drake:
216:50 User:Anne Chambers
io calls have been raised for this branch as a result of its appearance on any Horizon reconciliation reports in the last 9
months, nor has the postmaster reported any system problems when balancing. Hence we were not aware that they had any problem,
hich is why you have not been notified about it.
i can confirm that the non-zero trading position on the BTS was not caused by the known issues last autumn or earlier this year -
lthe checks made at the time should have identified this branch if that had been the cause, and the balance reports ete do not
show the signs associated with those problems. The branch did not have a receipts and payments mismatch on any stock unit
rollover.
so my investigation has to start from first principles. So long after the event, the only information readily available to me are
the balance reports and branch trading statements from the last year, which you may also have. From these, I can see that?
[fe 2 to TP 8: branch appears to have had a shortage each month (apart from TP4), ranging from £312.50 to £4197.60. These
shortages were not settled centrally.
[tp 9: branch accepted a loss of £1888.73, which was moved into local suspense on 27th December, but somehow not cleared. The
system should not have allowed the stock unit to be rolled over. The loss shows on the balance report but not on the BTS. This is
the cause of the non-zero trading position in TP 9. I need to retrieve data from the audit servers to confirm what happened,
hich will take several days.
Ip 10: it is highly likely that the £1888.73 non-zero trading position is a consequence of an error in the opening figures
written at the end of TP 9. You can see from the Branch Trading Statements that the TP 10 Cash B Fwd is £1888.73 more than the TP
Ip Cash C Fwd.
in addition there was a shortage of £3264.06, which was settled centrally. Until I have the archived data I am not sure whether
this includes the loss from the previous period or not.
tp 11 to TP 1: significant losses, settled centrally. No anomalies on the Branch Trading Statements.
ly conclusion at this stage is that the branch appears to have had losses for some time, from well before the system problem on
27th December. There is nothing to suggest that any system problem has caused the losses, although the TP 9/10 figures need to be
investigated further to understand the impact of that problem. It would not have had any impact beyond TF 10.
Ik will follow up this final point, but in the absence of any other specifically-reported issues with the system in general,
cannot investigate further into the cause of the losses. If this aspect is to be pursued, I think a separate call should be
jraised via the Post Office / Fujitsu security teams.
[End of Response]
lkesponse code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
lkesponse was delivered to Consumer
Date:16-May-2008 09:24:40 Uscr:Anne Chambers
[Start of Response]
fo investigate the system problem fully, I need the messagestore for branch 141832 from 19th December 2007 to 23rd January 2008.
FUJ00154683
FUJ00154683
‘an you extract it from the audit servers please:
{End of Response]
Response code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
Response was delivered to Consumer.
Date:16-May-2008 09:25:01 User:Anne Chambers
the Call record has been transferred to the team: Security Ops
the Call record has been assigned to the Team Member: Penny Thomas
progress was delivered to Provider
Date: 20-May-2008 09:10:50 User:Penny Thomas
Evidence Added - Mess © 07 te 23 Jan 08
JDate:20-May-2008 09:11:28 Uscr:Penny Thomas
[fhe Call record has been transferred to the team: EDSC
Progress was delivered to Provider
jDate:20-May-2008 09:21:03 Uscr:Lorraine Guibli
[fhe Call record has been assigned to the Team Member: Anne Chambers
Progress was delivered te Provider
Date: 27-May-2008 18:32:53 User:Anne Chambers
(Start of Response]
cause of problem on 27th December:
here was contention between the balancing process, when it tried to write the accumulated loss into local suspense, and the end
lof day processes running at 7pm.
evidence that this happened:
la) counter messages show that the clerk accepted a discrepancy for the BP of £705.48. There was a carried forward loss of
k:1183.25 from earlier BPs.
lb) at the point where I expected to see messages writing the loss to local suspense, and then local suspence being cleared, there
as an NT event indicating a lock problem on the messagestore. We have seen such events cause problems once or twice before (the
leffect depends on precisely what is happening at the time; frequently it is benign).
lc) the missing local suspense / clearance messages resulted in a non-zero trading position on the BTS for TP 9
las a result, the total loss for TP 9 of £1888.73 was not cleared in any way. At the branch it effectively vanished. On POLFS it
lcemains in the discrepancy account.
It made some additional checks which confirm that the losses recorded in TP 10 match the difference between the cash transactions
jrecorded on the system and the cash declared at the end of each week. The loss from TP 9 was not carried forward into the next
Ire.
[the non-zero trading position on the P10 BTS is caused by the cash on hand B Fwd line (which is actually calculated and saved at
the point of the previous TP rollover) being £1888.73 higher than the C Fwd value on the previous report. This value is not used
lanywhere else in the balancing process. The B/F figure on the TP 10 BP 1 balance report shows that the correct value was used
there.
It have checked whether the same problem could have caused other problems at this branch:
Hh. In the last year, no other non-zero trading positions.
2. Receipts and payments match on all the balance reports.
8. since last August, the NT event has occurred at this branch twice, once on 27th Dec and then on 13th Feb.
I checked this second instance thoroughly and am satisfied that it did not cause any financial error. It occurred while the
counter was at an earlier point in the balancing process. The discrepancy of £2223.48 (loss) in TP 11 BP 3 was the difference
between the cash transactions recorded on the system and the declared cash for the week. This was not a TP rollover, so local
suspense was not affected.
[End of Response]
lkesponse code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
lkesponse was delivered to Consumer
jbate:27-May-2008 18:33:13 User:Anne Chambers
the Call record has been transferred to the team: MSU-Indt Mgt
lerogress was delivered to Provider
Date: 28-May-2008 14:47:19 User:Claire Drake
[Start of Response]
[thank you Anne. I have issued the final BIMS to POL. Returning call to EDSC for closure.
[End of Response]
lkesponse code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
FUJ00154683
FUJ00154683
bate: 28-May-2008 14:47:25 Uscr:Claire Drake
[the Call record has been transferred to the team: EDSC
Progress was delivered to Provider
Date:28-May-2008 15:06:27 User:Clive Turrell
Defect cause updated to 41: General - in Procedure
IDate:28-May-2008 15:06:37 User:Glive Turrell
[Start of Response]
{End of Response]
Response code to call type L as Category 40 -- Pending -- Incident Under Investigation
lkesponse was delivered to Consumer
Date: 28-May-2008 15:07:54 User:Clive Turrell
[Start of Response]
can this call please now be closed
[End of Response]
lkesponse code to call type L as Category 95 -- Final -- Advice after Investigation
outing to Call Logger following Final Progress update.
service Response was delivered to Consumer
Date: 28-May-2008 15:07:54 User:Clive Turrell
CALL PCO158102 closed: Category 95 Type L
Date: 29-May-2008 08:00:23 User:_Customer Call_
consumer XXXXXX@TFS01 has acknowledged the call closure
joate:02-Jun-2008 11:38:38 User:Anne Chambers
evidence Added ~ Further query and re
JDate:01-Aug-2008 15:31:08 User:Anne Chambers
evidence Added =
ther response 26th June
jate:01-Sep-2008 14:31:12 User:Anne Chambers
evidence Added - fe
lDate:01-Sep-2008 14:32:07 User:Anne Chambers
Evidence Added ~ attempt to explain non-zero trading position
Root Cause General - in Procedure
Logger _Customer Call_ -- EDSC
Subject Product General/Other/Misc -- Unknown General/Other/Misc (version unspecified)
Assignee _Customer Call_ -- EDSC
Last Progress 01-Sep-2008 14:32 -- Anne Chambers