POL00004618
POL00004618
Mr Mike Wakley Alan Bates
Post Office Limited The Wool Post
Celtic Court Craig-y-don Post Office
Tremaines Road Queens Road
BRIDGEND LLANDUDNO
CF31 1TZ LL30 1AZ,
15" May 2003
Reference: Losses and Gains
Dear Mr Wakley
With regard to your letter dated 2" May 2003, I presume the Terms and Conditions of my Contract
of Service you refer to are those I acknowledged on the 31 March 1998 and not 31 March 2003 as
stated in your letter.
You refer me-to section 12 of that contract “The Subpostmaster is responsible for all losses caused
through his own negligence, carelessness or error, and also for losses of all kinds caused by his
Assistants. Deficiencies due to such losses must be made good without delay.” You rightly point
out that I have agreed these terms and I can confirm I would gladly make good any losses caused in
these manners, But I can see nothing in this clause which states that 1 am also liable for data ] am
unable to check.
Taken to an extreme, if the Horizon system said I owed £1,000,000 you would say I would have to
make good the loss without delay and without question.
There is no way I will agree to be held responsible for data I have input until such time as I am able
to access the data that 1 am being asked to be responsible for. In trying to state that I have
acknowledged such things in the Terms and Conditions of my Contract of Service you are in effect
purporting to vary this contract.
As we are talking about matters contractual I would also draw your attention to item 4.5, and
reference is also made in item 4.4 of the Conditions of Appointment for Craig Y Don Sub Post Office
included in the Contract of Service. This relates to the National Lottery playstation which was
already installed and operational when we took over the business. The Post Office removed the
machine at the end of January 1999 despite all my protests both written and verbal about the loss of
revenue they were going to cause me, about how it had been part of my business plan revenue
projection, of how we had doubled the turnover of the terminal in the few months we had been in
office. I presume the Post Office will now be returning the terminal to us and making good the loss
of income we have incurred during the period we were without the terminal.
Finally, in respect of an issue I raised with you in my letter dated 3" December 2003, namely
recovering the financial shortfall from the private side of our business due to Post Office Limited’s
actions. Our accounts are currently with the firm of Chartered Accounts we use, who are preparing a
statement on the level of shortcomings we have incurred. It will be significant and we will be
looking to recover that lost income swiftly. In the meantime I would appreciate it if you would
ascertain to whom the correspondence should be directed, in order to minimise the delay in meeting
,-obPelaim...Ox.wonld.it-he hetter to address it to you?
~ Aran Bates; Suogusnmaster Craig-y-Don Post Office
#82198 E1/39/1