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Initial Complaint Review and Mediation Scheme
Post Office Investigation Report
Branch Name: Gaerwen Branch Code: 160604 Case Number: M029
Applicant Name: I Mr Hughie Status of Case: Date of June 1994 —
Noel Thomas Appointment: I October 2005
Executive summary
The Applicant was the Subpostmaster of Gaerwen Post Office from June 1994 until he was suspended
following an audit on 13th October 2005. The audit revealed a shortage of £48,454.87 and a cheque
discrepancy of £1,803.02 resulting in a final shortage figure of £50,257.89.
Following the outcome of the audit and the subsequent interview (undertaken with members of the
Investigation Team), the Applicant was subject to criminal proceedings in line with Post Office's business
investigation policy.
The sentencing report (Doc 010) states that the Applicant appeared at Caernarfon Crown Court on 6"
November 2006 and was sentenced on the charge of ‘False Accounting’ (to which he had pleaded guilty at an
earlier hearing on 29" September 2006)
The Applicant was sentenced to 9 months in custody and ordered to pay £750 costs.
Due to the age of this case (1994 — 2005) and POL's business document retention policies, there is limited
information available to investigate the specific issues raised by the Applicant.
Training
The Applicant has raised concerns about the lack of adequate training provided by POL in relation to the depth
of knowledge required and the duration of the training. Records of the Applicant's training are no longer
available having being destroyed under POL's business retention policies. Although there is no evidence of the
Applicant requesting further training on Horizon operational issues, there may be a future learning
opportunity for Post Office where frequent calls received from a branch on the same subject are escalated
appropriately in order that extra help/training can be offered if deemed necessary.
Technical Issues
The Applicant has raised a number of points regarding Horizon technical issues and transaction anomalies.
The Applicant estimated that he contacted the helpdesk once a week from when the system was installed in
October 2000. Unfortunately, Horizon Service Desk (HSD) call logs are no longer available so these numbers
are unable to be verified
Call logs from the Network Business Support Centre (NBSC) indicate that only 3 out of 138 calls received in the
5 year period between October 2000 and October 2005 were relevant to the HSD and transferred accordingly.
Installation of a new Horizon System
The issues raised by the Applicant regarding Horizon include the installation of new Horizon kit prior to the
incoming Subpostmaster taking up post. Available information suggests that this was to allow testing to be
cartied out on the ‘old’ equipment to check its integrity in view of the Applicant's concerns regarding its
integrity. Although no documentation has been located regarding the outcome of these tests, it could be
concluded that those tests did not reveal any issues as the Applicant's prosecution continued as planned.
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SPM Contract
The Applicant does not recall ever having been given a copy or signing a copy of his Subpostmaster contract.
The process in place at the time of the Applicant’s appointment stipulated Subpostmasterswould receive a
copy of their signed contract, along with their appointment letter and welcome pack. As no records are
available from the time when the Applicant became a Subpostmaster, Post Office cannot determine whether
this process was followed in this particular instance.
Summary
Overall, there is nothing to suggest from the available documentation that Horizon malfunctions caused the
loss incurred by the Applicant. The evidence points to user error by the Subpostmaster (or his assistants) and a
need for quicker identification by Post Office of issues in this branch (followed by the cascading of relevant
training or intervention) given the pattern of calls/issues being raised by the branch.
The Applicant's complaint
The Applicant has raised issues and complaints in 13 key areas (listed below).
- Inadequate training provided
- Technical issues with Horizon
- Horizon transaction anomalies — nil value balance following cash withdrawals
- Horizon transaction anomaly — relating to an issue regarding Giro deposits “cut off”
- New Horizon system installation
- Helpline assistance
- Removal of items from Gaerwen branch during the October 2005 audit
- Subpostmaster Contract
- Accounting difference of approximately £3k in 2003/04 which was settled on a 50/50 basis
- Criminal Proceedings
- Pressure placed on Applicant to plead guilty to false accounting and the theft charge be dropped
- Bankruptcy
- Data Protection Request
Each subject is dealt with more extensively in the ‘responses’ section of this document.
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Case Review Actions
Summary of the information collated by POL
Information available from POL records:
Information
provided with
this response
Information area
Information not
available as beyond
retention period
Information not available for
other reason
Transactional Data x
Horizon Helpdesk x
Electronic Casework File I X
NBSC Call log Oct 2000 - I X
Oct 2005
Horizon Service Desk x
Background information I X
provided in emails
Data Protection Act x
request from Applicant
Training Records x
Response to issues raised by Applicant
Issue raised
Investigation findings
1. Inadequate training provided
Training records pertaining to the Applicant
have been destroyed under business retention
policies and are therefore no longer available.
Unfortunately POL cannot ascertain when the
Applicant's Horizon training took place when the
system went live at the branch on 18/10/2000.
Background information has been obtained from
POL training managers indicating the type of
training which would have been cascaded during
this period The training would have been as
follows:
1. Pre- Horizon: The standard induction course
lasted between 4-6 weeks (Doc 001 refers) with
onsite support lasting up to a further 2 weeks.
2. Training given to supplement the introduction
of Horizon was delivered by an external training
company and consisted of 1.5 days for Assistants
and 3 days for Subpostmasters (followed by 2
days on site with Horizon Field Support Officers
when the branch went live). These events
generally took place at an external venue and
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the participants had to pass a competency test
to receive a certificate enabling them to use the
system in a live environment (Doc 002 refers).
There is nothing to suggest that this training was
not provided to the Applicant.
There are no calls recorded on the NBSC
helpdesk call logs (Doc 003 refers) from the
Applicant requesting any additional Horizon
training.
Technical issues with Horizon
The HSD call logs are no longer available under
business retention policies (Doc 004 refers).
However, the NBSC call logs from October2000 —
Oct 2005 are available (Doc 003 refers).
The NBSC call data for the 5 year period shows
that 36 calls out of a total of 138 logged were
Horizon related (highlighted in yellow on Doc
003). However, as stated above, calls made to
the HSD are no longer available so interrogation
of this data is not possible.
It should be noted that a witness statement
provided by Andy Dunks of Fujitsu dated 6" April
2006 for the purposes of the criminal
proceedings (Doc 005), states that during the
period 1°t November 2004 — 30" November
2005, he reviewed 13 calls made to the HSD
from Gaerwen Post Office. His professional
opinion was that “none of these calls related to
faults which would have had an effect on the
integrity of the information held on the system”.
Horizon transaction anomalies — nil value
balance following cash withdrawals
The Applicant references numerous Post Office
Card Account withdrawal (and personal banking)
transactions where Horizon showed a nil value
for that transaction but he subsequently
continued to pay out the cash to the customer.
Nil value transactions on card withdrawals are
part of the customer process depending on
requirements. They can occur as follows (Doc
006, page 7 refers):-
- When only requesting a balance
enquiry
- Incorrect PIN number entered
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- _ Insufficient funds in the account
- Card blocked after 3 unsuccessful
attempts to enter correct PIN
- Withdrawal limit exceeded
- Online authorisation not received from
card provider
Analysis was undertaken prior to the trial by the
Investigation Manager on nil value transactions
for 3 separate periods at the branch to test the
integrity of the system (Doc 007). The results
categorically showed Horizon was operating
correctly and all nil value transactions appeared
with valid reasons with no failures being due to
system integrity or data.
If cash had been paid out on nil value
transactions this would suggest operator error,
rather than Horizon failure.
Horizon transaction anomaly — relating to an
issue regarding Giro deposits “cut off”
“Cut off” refers to the process whereby a
number of reports for specific products / types
of stock are produced on a daily basis at the
counter.
Once the transactions contained within each
report have been checked by a Subpostmaster
and confirmed to be correct , they are “cut off”,
which allows the totals to be saved to that day's
accounts and a new period commenced with a
nil value.
Due to the time elapsed, the transactional data
for this branch is no longer available and cannot
therefore be interrogated.
Failing to “cut off” is a common oversight
throughout the network and in itself does not
cause any errors or balancing anomalies. If a
day's Giro deposits are not “cut off”, the total
will accumulate into the following day and at
“cut off” 2 days’ worth of Giro deposits will be
displayed. This doesn’t impact on the office
balance. The only mitigation needed is to
manually amend the Giro slip being dispatched
at the end of the day to correspond with the
slips taken only on that day.
There are several instances on the NBSC call logs
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of the Applicant requesting guidance on the
procedure when “cut off” hadn’t been
performed (Doc 003 lines 6, 13, 46, 61, 62, 114
refer). This suggests the Applicant was
struggling to understand this element of the
Horizon process over an extended period of time
despite help being provided by NBSC.
New Horizon system installation
‘A new Horizon kit was installed at the re-located
branch prior to its opening in January 2006.
It is believed that the equipment already on site
could not be re-used by the incoming
Subpostmaster as the Applicant had questioned
its integrity. In Doc 006, reference is made by
Diane Matthews (Investigation Manager) to
Fujitsu tests being carried out on the equipment
(page 9 refers) and a response being awaited
from Fujitsu. No further correspondence can be
found relating to such a response. However, the
assumption would be that no issues were found
with the equipment as the criminal case against
the Applicant proceeded.
Doc 007 (highlighted in yellow), also states that
“the Horizon System Helpdesk (HSH) who
monitor the working of the system have not
been alerted to any hardware problems through
there off site monitoring or by any complaints
raised by the staff at the branch”.
RoMEC (Royal Mail Engineering & Construction),
(the facilities management services provider for
POL), were initially due to remove the kit from
the branch. However, it appears that the kit was
taken by Fujitsu to allow the equipment testing
to be undertaken. No documentation is available
in relation to this due to business retention
policies.
Likewise, no documentation is available in
relation to any conversations the Applicant may
have had with RoMEC engineers regarding the
removal of the Horizon equipment.
Helpline assistance
As stated above, the HSD call logs are no longer
available but the NBSC call logs from Oct 2000 —
Oct 2005 are available (Doc 003).
The Applicant states that he made
approximately one call per week to the HSD
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from when Horizon was installed in 2000.
The statement from Andy Dunks of Fujitsu (Doc
005) states that from 1° November 2004 — 30"
November 2005 there were only 13 calls
(average 1 per month) made by the Applicant
and in his opinion none of these related to faults
which would have affected the integrity of
Horizon.
Within the NBSC call logs (Doc 003), there are 3
calls (highlighted in green on lines 44, 115, 121)
in relation to attempts to contact the RLM
(Retail Line Manager) although no mention is
made of the subject matter. On one of these
occasions (01/03/02), a call was escalated as the
Applicant hadn’t received a response. Other
than the aforementioned escalation, there is no
evidence of calls or requests being refused or
ignored from the available data.
In addition, 3 calls to the NBSC were transferred
to the HSD (Doc 003, lines 10, 11 and 68 refer).
Due to the absence of HSD call logs in this case,
it is not possible to form an opinion on the
service the Applicant received specifically in
terms of issues relating to the Horizon
equipment.
NBSC call logs show a high volume of calls from
the office on a variety of subjects. There is
nothing in the available data to indicate that the
Applicant received anything other than a
professional service with satisfactory outcomes
to the issues raised in the calls.
Removal of items from Gaerwen branch
during the October 2005 audit.
There is no documentation available relating to
items taken by POL personnel during the branch
audit and subsequent investigation. It is a
business policy to remove items that are
believed to be pertinent to any investigation.
The physical case file for this investigation has
been destroyed under POL's business retention
policies.
The Area Intervention Manager Visit Log (Doc
008) states that the Applicant was allowed into
the secure area at the branch on the 14”
October 2005 to remove personal belongings.
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Subpostmaster Contract
Contractual documentation relating to the
Applicant is no longer available as it has been
destroyed under business retention policies.
However, the contractual process in place at the
time of the Applicant’s appointment ensured
that:
- On the day of transfer, the incoming
Subpostmaster would be required to
sign an Acknowledgment of
Appointment (P931); a 1 page
document that stated they been given,
and accepted the terms of the standard
Subpostmaster’s Contract.
- Also, on the day of transfer, the new
Subpostmaster would sign the P13
Official Secrets Act form, in duplicate,
with one copy being associated with
the branch file and the other left with
the Subpostmaster.
= Inthe event that there wasn’t a copy of
the Subpostmaster’s Contract in the
branch, the trainer/auditor should have
contacted the Agency Recruitment
Team so that they could have arranged
for a duplicate to be provided to the
Subpostmaster.
Further information about this process is
available in Doc 009.
Accounting difference of approximately £3k in
2003/04 which was settled on a 50/50 basis
No documentary evidence of such an agreement
has been found in the materials available but
any related files have now been destroyed under
business retention policies.
Reference to this "agreement" is made in Doc
007 (page 5) where it is stated by the Applicant
that such an agreement was reached with the
Contracts Manager. This cannot be corroborated
due to the reason given above.
Please note a previous incident highlighted in
Doc 007 (page 8) involving the Applicants
daughter - Sian Thomas, which resulted in the
Applicant repaying POL £11,000. At the audit in
October 2005, Sian was still listed as a user on
Horizon, despite the Applicant stating that only
himself and his wife had user ID’s. Terms of re-
instatement agreed between the Applicant and
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the Retail Line Manager were on the basis that
Sian would no longer work or have access to the
branch.
It is not possible to ascertain whether Sian
Thomas continued to serve in the office after
the previous problems as transactional data is
not available due to the time elapsed and
business retention policies. It is a concern
though that her User ID had not been removed
from the Horizon system in line with the agreed
terms of the Applicant's re-instatement.
10.
Criminal Proceedings
The Applicant was subject to criminal
proceedings in line with POL's business
investigation policy following the outcome of
the audit on 13" October 2005 and the
subsequent interview undertaken with members
of the Investigation Team.
The sentencing report (Doc 010) states that the
Applicant appeared at Caernarfon Crown Court
on 6" November 2006, and was sentenced on
the charge of ‘False Accounting’, to which he
had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing on
September 29".
The Applicant was sentenced to 9 months in
custody and ordered to pay £750 costs.
11.
Pressure placed on Applicant to plead guilty to
false accounting and the theft charge be
dropped.
There is no reference in any available
documentation as to when or why an initial
charge of theft was dropped, with only the false
accounting charge being pursued.
12.
Bankruptcy
No claim was made by POL in the Applicant's
bankruptcy proceedings, with the outstanding
amount of £44,250.91 being written off on the
15/11/2008 (Doc 011 refers).
13.
Data Protection Request
No records are available of a DPA request being
received from the Applicant.
Contact has been made with the Royal Mail
Information Rights Team who would have been
responsible for such requests at that time. They
have requested information going back to 2009
but the Applicant doesn’t appear on this list.
Information prior to this has been destroyed in
line with their retention schedule (Doc 012
refers).
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List documents (if any)
M029_Horizon Email_JO_001
Training background information pre-Horizon
MO029_Training Email_JO_002
Horizon training background information
M029_NBSC Call Log Oct 2000 -13 Oct 2005_JO_003
NBSC call log
MO029_ARQs out with retention 221113_JO_004
Fujitsu HSD call logs out with retention period
™M029_CQR_Tab_3_JO_005
Fujitsu witness statement
M029_Offender Report Hughie Thomas October
2005_JO_006
Post Office Investigation ‘Offender Report’
M029_Thomas Report Dec 05_JO_007
Post Office ‘investigation Legal’ document
M029_Area Intervention Manager Visit Log —
Gaerwen_JO_008
Area Intervention Manager Visit Log
M029_Contract Information Email_JO_009
Contract background information
MO029_Sentencing Report_JO_010
Court Sentencing Report
M029_Agent Accounting Email_JO_011
Former Agents accounting information
M029_Data Protection Email_JO_012
Data protection information