UKGI00008498 - Womble Bond Dickinson, Post Office Group Litigation re: Pamela Stubbs.

Evidence on official site

UKG100008498
UKG100008498

Post Office Group Litigation
Confidential and privileged information WOMBLE

BOND
DICKINSON
Pamela Stubbs

Branch: Barkham Post Office Branch®,
Dates of service: 23 September 1999 to 12 August 2010
Loss claimed: Roughly £67,000 for payments of shortfalls, loss of earnings post termination,

and loss of investment
Contract model: Standard Subpostmasters Contract 1994
Background:

Mrs Stubbs took over as Subpostmaster in September 1999 when her husband, the previous
Subpostmaster, passed away. Mrs Stubbs has been an assistant at the Branch since 1987.

In 2000 to 2001, Mrs Stubbs had problems with power outages at the Branch which caused the Horizon
system to crash and reboot. There were discrepancies in the Branch accounts which Mrs Stubbs
believed were due to the power outages over this period of time equating to around £1,000. These
shortfalls were made good by her.

Following the power supply issue there were no major issues with shortfalls until late 2009 when the
Horizon equipment was relocated to a portacabin due to redevelopment works at the branch premises.

A significant number of shortfalls occurred and payment of these was requested. In the spring of 2010,
Mrs Stubbs wanted to advertise the Branch for sale and had a prospective purchaser. On 12 May 2010
Mrs Stubbs sent in her letter of resignation. One final audit was conducted on 8 June 2010 following Mrs
Stubbs resignation which found a shortfall of £4,837.87. Mrs Stubbs was suspended the same day and
remained suspended until her resignation took effect.

Key allegations made:
Mrs Stubbs claims, in addition to the generic complaints made by all Claimants, that:

There was no appointment process and that she never received a copy of the Standard
Subpostmasters Contract.

She was unable to identify the cause of apparent shortfalls from the information she had access
to using Horizon.

The discrepancies in the branch accounts in 2000/2001 were due to power outages which
caused the Horizon terminal to crash and reboot.

The Horizon terminal was relocated to a portacabin during Branch refurbishment in 2009.
Following this move she experienced shortfalls in her Branch accounts so there must be some
correlation between the two.

Reason for resignation:

On 12 May 2010 Mrs Stubbs sent a letter of resignation to Post Office noting she had two
individuals whom were interested in purchasing the Branch.

Post Office believed that Mrs Stubbs or her assistants were the cause of the losses in her

branch; those losses being exacerbated by the move to the portacabin whose unfamiliar
surroundings created an increased risk of manual error when conducting transactions.

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