POL00029301
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 54(3)(a)
and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Statement of William Leslie Mitchell
Age if under 18 Over 18 (If over 18 insert ‘over 18')
This statement (consisting of -9-- pages each signed by me) is true to the best of my knowledge and
belief and I make it knowing that, if it is tendered in evidence, I shall be liable to prosecution if I have
wilfully stated in it anything which I know to be false or do not believe true.
Dated the 15" day of = April 2005
Signature
I have been employed by Fujitsu Services, Post Office Account, formally ICL Pathway Ltd.,
since the 22" September 2003 as Security Manager where I am responsible for audit data
extractions and IT Security. I have working knowledge of the computer system known as
Horizon, which is a computerised accounting system used by Post Office Ltd. I am authorised
by Fujitsu Services to undertake extractions of audit data held on the Horizon system and to
obtain information regarding system transaction information processed on the Horizon system.
I have been asked to provide details and information on the reports that monitor faults, polling
failures, equipment failures and calls for advice and guidance logged by the Horizon System
Helpdesk recorded during the period from the 1* April 2002 to the 30" April 2003 for the
Shobnall Road Post Office - FAD Code 395207.
I have reviewed the helpdesk calls pertaining to this office and during the period 1% April 2002
to the 30" April 2003 there were 32 calls from Shobnall Road Post Office - FAD Code 395207
to the Helpdesk. I am of the opinion that none of these calls relate to faults which would have
had an effect on the integrity of the information held on the system. A breakdown of the calls
is given below:
1. Postmaster requesting help and advice on using Horizon System functions = 3.
2. Flood =3.
3. No Electrical Power = 2
3. Hardware problems = 6
4. Log On failure = 2.
Signature Signature witnessed by
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
5. Non Polling Issues = 3
6. User Error =5
7. OBC requests = 6.
8. OSP Requests = 1
9. Wrong Number = 1
Details of the calls and an overview of the calls are given in date order below:
1* July 2002, 1554hrs, Call Reference E-0207011009 — Postmaster (PM) they have had a
power cut and it has been off for some time, PM hung up before being transferred.
Resolution: Call Abandoned - Call Closed.
3" July 2002, 1200hrs, Call Reference E-0207030539 — Claire @ National Business Support
Centre (NBSC) reports that the PM is having electrical work done. Resolution: PM contacted
and advised that it will be Ok to power down the kit — Call Closed.
4" July 2002, 1017hrs, Call Reference E-0207040605 — Sue @ NBSC, PM advised that she
has not balanced yet, she has done the stock revaluation and the adjusted stock figures are
not correct. PM has not been able to rollover due to the end of day marker being sent down
and revaluation not been done correctly. PM has revalued incorrectly several times.
Resolution: PM had not been able to rollover due to end of day marker being sent down and
repeated revaluations had not being done correctly. Reversed all incorrect revaluations, this is
now correct and PM has rolled over. Call information modified from EPOSS to 'EPOSS-Cash
Account Problem - Call Closed.
18th July 2002, 1707hrs, Call Reference E-0207181192 — Tracey @ NBSC transferred call
H11714170 PM reports that she has no access to logout and administration functions and
wants to know what to do. Resolution: Advised the PM the system was in ‘suspense’ mode
and the correct process to resolve the problem. PM reports that she has now logged out
successfully after printing the balance snapshot — Call Closed.
10 September 2002, 1400hrs, Call Reference E-0209100810 — Trish @ NBSC is calling to
say that this office will be closed today due to flood damage. Resolution: Call reassigned as
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(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
Administration, Management Support Unit (MSU) is aware — Call Closed.
11 September 2002, 1536hrs, Call Reference E-0209111168 — Trish @ NBSC This office is
going to be closed until tomorrow due to flood damage. Resolution: Call reassigned as
Administration, MSU is aware — Call Closed.
12 September 2002, 0930hrs, Call Reference E-0209120238 — Debbie @ NBSC
H20766441 Office re-opened this morning. Resolution: MSU is aware — Call Closed.
4" December 2002, 1127hrs, Call Reference E-0212040322 — Adele @ NBSC Office closed
from 1 pm today, re-open tomorrow due to balance problems. Resolution: MSU made aware -
Call Closed.
4" December 2002, 1843hrs, Call Reference E-0212040890 — Lesley @ NBSC Office re-
opening tomorrow at 9 am. Resolution: MSU made aware - Call Closed.
6"" December 2002, 1216hrs, Call Reference E-0212060410 — Debbie @ NBSC. PM reports
that her keyboard and touch screen will not respond. PM reports that she says it freezes then
unfreezes all on its own, and it is doing this quite regularly. Resolution: Engineer dispatched
to site, arrived at 13:14 on 06-12-2002 and replaced touch screen due to phantom transaction
/calibration problems — Call Closed.
10" December 2002, 1149hrs, Call Reference E-0212100346 — PM states that the monitor is
still faulty. The power switch does not work and the PM is experiencing phantom transactions,
she has cleaned the screen and checked all the cables and they all look secure. PM will allow
access at the following times; today until 1800 hours and tomorrow between 0800-1800 hours
— Resolution: Engineer dispatched to site arrived at 14:03 hours on 10-12-2002 replaced
touch screen due to faulty on/off switch and tested Ok. — Call Closed.
12" December 2002, 1516hrs, Call Reference E-0212120663 - PM had a new touch screen
and data cable on Friday and again on Tuesday, both engineers say this is not a monitor
problem, it is doing phantom transactions and not registering real transactions. PM has one
shared stock unit and one user and states she had a witness when she was counting the 1°
class stamps and that the total was different from the system balance. The PM also said the
‘manager’ was with her when they were trying to do special deliveries, home shopping and
Signature Signature witnessed by
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(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
parcel traffic, she entered the nominated amount and the system said there were no
transactions. Monitor and cables have been swapped but figures are still changing.
Resolution: Engineer dispatched and arrived on site at 16:48 hours on 16-12-2002, replaced
base unit and keyboard, however, an ISDN problem was also identified and notified to Horizon
System Helpdesk (HSH) — Call Closed.
13 December 2002, 1224hrs, Call Reference E-0212130390 — Clair Dowsett @ Service
Management Centre (SMC) — This FAD is non-polling, a problem with the ISDN line was
outlined in call E-0212120663, with engineer attempting a base unit swap which failed at 3% of
system download — Resolution: ISDN connectivity was restored, site is communicating and an
end of day marker has been received - Call Closed.
16 December 2002, 1257hrs, Call Reference E-0212160616 - PM called as she is waiting
for a British Telecom (BT) engineer to call to fix the ISDN line and wants to know when he will
be there — Resolution: Call reassigned to HSH5, but was unable to contact the PM - Call
Closed.
3 January 2003, 1531hrs, Call Reference E-0301030710 — PM has problems with the touch
screen and colour. Resolution: Talked caller through factory reset and adjusting screen in
engineer screen. Display is Ok, but screen failed again even though calibration was Ok,
Advised caller to reboot and call back if the problem was the same — Call Closed
3 January 2003, 1600hrs, Call Reference E-0301030748 — PM had problem with touch
screen earlier she was advised a reboot which has not resolved the problem. Resolution:
Advised PM to recalibrate screen again the cross did not move when she tried this, earlier call
ref E-0301030710. Call was to be passed across for an engineer to call as the recalibration
failed, however, on contacting PM she reports that the touch facility is now functioning as it
should — PM had rebooted and now the monitor is responding to touch — Call Closed.
6" January 2003, 1236hrs, Call Reference E-0301060557 - PM having problem with system:
has been failing to register transactions; freezing when scanning and when unfreezes there
are sometimes phantom transactions in stack, pm upset at having to reboot so often, presently
frozen on print screen. Resolution: System shows symptoms of freezing. Don Banham, the
Field Service Manager (FSM) is going out to the site next week. Call suspended pending FSM
Signature Signature witnessed by
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(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
visit on 13" Jan 2003 — Following FSM visit the call was closed on Tue 14 January 2003 and
new call raised as potential environmental issue, so that we can monitor and investigate
without SLA — Call Closed.
8" January 2003, 1340hrs, Call Reference E-0301080539 - This site has been experiencing
screen freezes. PM not happy because she has already had 3 monitor swaps, 1 base unit
swap and 1 keyboard swap. Resolution: Voiced Don Banham FSM to inform him of the
situation. He is due to visit the site on 13" January 2003 — Call Closed.
14" January 2003, 1728hrs, Call Reference E-0301140688 - PM has been having numerous
issues, call originally logged as software but no software issue has been found. PM would like
further investigation into these problems. Resolution: Call forwarded to Senior Technician
within Horizon Incident Team (HIT) for further investigation. The Service Control Team (SCT)
is to monitor the site for 4 weeks. However, on the 27" Jan 2003 the HIT informed the SCT
that they can not find anything that may lead to software problems by checking the daily
events. The PM has not called the helpdesk with any abnormal transactions during this period.
Advised that the call should be closed as there had been no further calls from the PM — Call
Closed.
15 January 2003, 1552hrs, Call Reference E-0301150781 - FSM would like an engineer to
go the site to swap the monitor and change the cables. FSM would also like the engineer to
install Shielded Lan and Chromeric Collars. Resolution: Call escalated to Bill Burrows for
further investigation. Engineer advised not to attend pending more information. The call was
also escalated to Karen Harrod, SCT Manager to escalate to Dave Law for progression — Call
Closed.
16" January 2003, 1138hrs, Call Reference E-0301160426 — Please see call ref no E-
0301140688 for further information. Please check the message stores for any anomalies as
requested by Don Banham. The PM is having issues balancing cheques and the system is
asking the PM to declare cash when initially logging onto the system at the start of business.
The message is 'Declaration outstanding, the overnight cash holding declaration for this stock
unit was not entered. Please enter it now’. The PM is carrying out the correct procedure for
EOD reports as observed on Weds 15/1/03, however, at the time of FSM visit at 0900 on
Signature Signature witnessed by
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
20/01/03 the PM had a message asking her to declare cash on screen. Apart from this no
other issues were observed during the 2.5 hours the system was monitored by the FSM.
Resolution: SSC have not been able to find any indication of problems that might be caused
by software errors, however, the PM does not seem to be following the correct procedures for
balancing and ONCH declaration. Claims of transactions entered and then ‘lost’ from system
are not borne out by examination of message store and log files. PM advised, but is not happy
with the response.
Nick Crow has spoken to the PM who is still progressing the electrical issues, e.g. the removal
of a baby monitor, fax phone and other non-approved equipment from the counter, things are
now stable. The SCT were requested to monitor the site until Nick Crow has been to the site.
Fri 07 March 2003 09:55 contacted Nick Crow. Nick has been to the site, there are no further
issues with the site. Nick has agreed to call closure — Call Closed.
17" January 2003, 1047hrs, Call Reference E-0301170233 — Sheila @ NBSC transferred the
call H20884663, the PM wants to page their FSM Don Banham. Resolution: Advised the PM
that we will speak to service control, spoke to Reshma who advised that this request has been
escalated and the message has gone through — Advised the PM that the call has been
escalated and the msg has gone out for Don Banham — Call Closed.
17" January 2003, 1415hrs, Call Reference E-0301170456 — Don Banham: Please can you
investigate an issue concerning the PM's assistant being unable to log onto the system, as
discussed between Don Banham and Mik Peach. Agreed by Mik Peach and for Mik Peach's
attention. Resolution: Advice and guidance given, there are no failed logons on Saturday
18th Jan, user DWHO001 started to log on, but didn't complete the process and users ABILLO1
and 0000 attempted to log on the 15th Jan, but neither of these are valid usernames.
Regarding the issue with the PM’s father, no information was provided, but it is assume that
this is PWHO001, this user was moved from the MANAGERS Group to the SUPERVISORS
group 1% Oct 2002. The user hasn't been deleted. Voiced Don Banham who has spoken to
the PM who is unhappy with the response. Refer to call E-0301160426 for update of the
investigation - Call Closed.
24" January 2003, 1458hrs, Call Reference E-0301240569 - BIZ_ONC 16_10 Failed to
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
Distribute to this Node with an "Unable to Ping" error. Resolution: Health checks now
successful and awaiting result of the re-distribute to this Node — 30" January 2003 12:42
product now successfully distributed — Call Closed.
19" February 2003, 0838hrs, Call Reference E-0302190055 — PM rang wrong number — PM
realized she’d rang the wrong number and hung up. Resolution: Call Closed.
19" February 2003, 1256hrs, Call Reference E-0302190624 — Teresa @ NBSC called to
advised that the office closed at 1030 hrs and will re-open tomorrow H12169624. Resolution:
Office re-opened on 22" February 2003 at 1148hrs, reference E-030220499, Last EOD
received 1830hrs on 21% Feb 2003 — Call Closed.
20" February 2003, 1207hrs, Call Reference E-0302200499 — Amanda @ NBSC Post Office
is re-opening at 0900hrs today. Resolution: Office has re-opened reference E-0302190624,
Last EOD received on 21% Feb 2003 at 1830hrs — Call Closed.
24" March, 1622hrs, Call Reference E-0303240797 — Adele @ NBSC office closed @ 1620
24' Mar 2003, re-opens as normal tomorrow morning. Resolution: OBC call raised for re-
open, closing call EOD received and site communicating — Call Closed.
25" March 2003, 1129hrs, Call Reference E-0303250333 — Kat @ NBSC, Post Office re-
opening, re-opened as of 9am this morning. Resolution: OBC call raised for re-opening, EOD
received and site communicating — Call Closed.
8" April 2003, 1250hrs, Call Reference E-0304080470 — Ann @ NBSC, office closed at
1230hrs today. Resolution: OBC, site re-opened as per NBSC and E-0304140559 — Call
Closed.
14" April 2003, 1331hrs, Call Reference E-0304140559 — Malcolm @ NBSC, office re-
opened on Saturday 12". Resolution: OBC — site re-opened as per NBSC — Call Closed
16" April 2003, 1408hrs, Call Reference E-0304160505 — Liz @ NBSC, Requires OSP for
auditor (Paul Humber) all access — Auditor needed One Shot Password (OSP) to gain access
to system. Resolution: OSP was generated and given to auditor — Call Closed.
I have been asked in my capacity of Security Manager on the Post Office Account, to review
and comment regarding the root cause of a number of helpdesk calls logged by the Shobnall
Signature Signature witnessed by
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
Road Post Office, FAD Code 395207 and the possibility that phantom transactions had taken
place.
The term phantom transactions has been used in this instance to describe an occurrence were
there is physical interference with input devices such as screens and keyboards; these have
been reported and diagnosed with root causes such as, cats or dogs jumping up and putting
paws on keyboards, people leaning over their keyboards and inadvertently pressing keys,
cables being drawn across keyboards, keys becoming stuck down & other items being left on
keyboards and in instances where system freezes have occurred the repeated pressing of
touch screen icon or keys on the keyboard which may be stored in the memory buffer and when
the system unfreezes entered into the system. There have been incidents where
electromagnetic interference has caused malfunction of computer touch-screens but this has
not produced substantive evidence that phantom transactions have been a consequence of
such interference.
Where alleged phantom transactions resulting from interference to input devices as described
above have occurred, they have generally resulted in multiple sales of one item and were
consistent with one key being held down, or the touch screen icons being pressed more than
once; in these cases the items were always sale items such as mobile phone cards or stamps,
etc. However, this would always be reflected in the weekly cash account as an imbalance of
either stock or cash. There is no evidence available to me to suggest this was the case with
Shobnall Road.
Where phantom transactions were reported on a regular basis Fujitsu/ICL field personnel would
recommend procedural measures to identify and contain the source of the transactions; these
measures would include the following:
1) Advising the Post Master that a manual balance of the office should take place every day.
This would act as a check when compared with the system derived report.
2) Where there were multiple counters and serving staff, advise the Post Master to adopt
individual Stock units, this is a method of compartmentalising losses arising from unexplained
transactions by ensuring that individual staff are tied to one accounting entity, the stock unit.
3) Where there was a suspicion that there may be electromagnetic interference suspect items
Signature Signature witnessed by
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Witness Statement
(CJ Act 1967, s9; MC Act 1980, ss 5A(3)(a) and 5B, MC Rules 1981, r 70)
Continuation of statement of William Leslie Mitchell
such as florescent tubes and alarm system components were replaced; chromeric collars,
small collars made from metal, that can commonly be found on many items of electrical wiring
such as computer monitor leads, were attached to the Horizon equipment.
This type of action was recommended at Shobnall Road, but according to record the
replacement of florescent tubes, replacement of alarm system components and installation of
chromeric collars was never implemented. In other cases when the above measures were
exercised all instances of interference were resolved. However, in the majority of cases 'user
error’ was eventually attributed to be the cause, in some cases a staff member left and the
phantom transactions stopped and in some other cases the PM did not pursue the complaint.
There are no recorded cases where losses could be attributed to either physical or
electromagnetic interference to the Horizon equipment and I am of the opinion that the
incidents reported as phantom transactions were at best ‘user errors’.
At various times between the 18" and the 23" March 2005 hardcopy printouts of the 32 calls
detailing the information recorded on the helpdesk database for the required date period were
produced. I now produce the hardcopy printouts as Exhibit WLM/14.
Any records to which I refer in my statement form part of the records relating to the business of
Fujitsu Services. These were compiled during the ordinary course of business from
information supplied by persons who have or may reasonably be supposed to have personal
knowledge of the matter dealt with in the information supplied, but are unlikely to have any
recollection of the information or cannot be traced. As part of my normal duties, I have access
to these records.
Signature Signature witnessed by
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