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Paul Dann To: Martyn Mitchell/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
7 ce:
‘\ 09/11/2006 13:28 Subject: Castleton - Marine Drive URGENT URGENT URGENT
For Info
Former Agents Debt Team Leader
4st Floor West , No 1 Future Walk, West Bars, CHESTERFIELD, S49 1PF
rc }STD Phone: t
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----- Forwarded by Paul Dann/e/POSTOFFICE on 09/11/2006 13:27 —-—
wrerngrery Marie Cockett To: Paul Dann/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Andrew
¥ 3
, (> 09/11/2008 12:25 ve Winn/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
No Subject: Castleton - Marine Drive URGENT URGENT URGENT
Both
Re;Marine Drive
Marie
Branch Accounting & Control Manager
Post Office Ltd
Finance
First Floor East Block, 1 Future Walk, West Bars, CHESTERFIELD, S49 1PF
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named recipient you must not use, disclose, reproduce, copy or distribute the contents of this
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----- Forwarded by Marie Cockett/e/POSTOFFICE on 09/11/2006 12:25 ----
Mandy Talbot To: Marie Cockettfe/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, John D
. Cole/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Keith K
09/41/2006 10:40 Baines/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, David X
Smith/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Richard W
Barker/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Rod
Ismay/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
ce: Clare Wardle/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Biddy
Wyles/e/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
Subject: Castleton - Marine Drive URGENT URGENT URGENT
I have received some very good news about this case but now need the business to make an urgent
decision upon its future conduct.
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Our original claim against Castleton was in the region of 25K and he then entered a defence and counter
claim for 250K but of more concern brought the whole validity of the HORIZON system into question. As
a result we have expended a lot of legal costs to ensure that the defence to those allegations is as perfect
as possible.
On Friday Castleton's solicitors amended their defence/ counterclaim to reduce their counter claim to 11K.
Last night our barrister received a compromise offer from Castleton's solicitors probably brought on by the
fact that they are obliged to serve their statements on Friday together with their accountants report. We
suspect that their accountants report has not supported their claim.
The bare offer is as follows
1. they offer the sum of £22,350 in settlement of our claim
2. our costs on the standard basis
3. they want us to agree to pay rent or get the temp to pay rent for the continued occupancy of Marine
Drive .
they want us to pay the wages of the assistant employed there
they want a letter from us stating that proceedings were issued purely to recover a debt and that there
was no allegation of dishonesty
4.
5.
We can respond in a number of ways.
Firstly I think that we can all agree that their demand at 3 and 4 cannot be accepted because rent and
wages are a matter for Castleton to resolve with the current interim postmaster or possibly the previous
interim postmaster as I understand that there have been more than one of them.
Secondly as we have never pleaded that Castleton was dishonest there is no problem with us agreeing to
this demand. We believe that he is seeking to go back to work in the city and as such a statement from us
could be very valuable to him.
Thirdly the offer is defective in that it does not mention interest at all which we are entitled to on the debt
Fourthly no offer has been made to give a declaration to the effect that he withdraws all his allegations
about
the HORIZON system
Fifthly as we made a Part 36 offer to him in January of 2006 stating that if he would pay our full claim we
would not seek our costs which he rejected ,he is now obliged to pay our costs on the indemnity not the
standard basis since that date. If costs are awarded on the standard basis then traditionally the successful
party would recover between 60 -65% of the costs expended. Any dispute is resolved in favour of the
paying party. Costs on the indemnity basis means one recovers almost all of ones costs and any dispute
is resolved in favour of the receiving party. So there is quite a difference between the two.
Sixthly the reason given for not paying the full amount of the claim is spurious as we have demonstrated
to them on a number of occasion that there is no basis for their allegation that the accounts were
£3,509.18 short on week 49.
Seventhly the position in respect of costs is not as clear cut as it appears at first because the Courts have
an ability to cap the amount of costs awarded so as to make them proportionate to the size of the claim.
However they have to take a number of factors into consideration not merely the size of the claim but the
conduct of the parties, ours has been impeccable, the importance of the issues to the parties,
proportionality of the costs incurred to the size of the claim has however been emphasised in a recent
Court of Appeal decision. Therefore there is a risk that by rejecting an offer of standard costs that the
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Court could decide to cap the costs at say 60K and then award only 60% of that. Costs to date including
the work in progress and the work which the accountants have done together with Counsel's fees come to
approximately 140K.
However the trial is still a little while off and I think that we should aim for Castleton agreeing for
judgement to be entered against him in the full amount plus an agreement that he will consent to the
payment of a fixed sum in respect of costs. As a trade off we can offer the letter confirming that there was
no dishonesty and agree that we will not seek interest at an indemnity level. The benefit of having a
judgement against him in the full amount is that we will be able to use this to demonstrate to the network
that despite his allegations about HORIZON we were able to recover the full amount from him. It will be of
tremendous use in convincing other postmasters to think twice about their allegations.
Even if such a counter offer is rejected we still have time to negotiate but as we move nearer to the trial
date more costs are incurred daily so it is very important that we reach a decision and communicate it to
our external solicitor this morning if possible.
Please may I hear from you by e-mail or telephone as soon as possible
Regards
Mandy Talbot
Dispute Resolution
Company Secretary's Office
Royal Mail Legal Services
148 Old Street
London EC1V 9HQ . ;
Posilines_
External Email
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