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Witness Name: Liggins, Philip
STATEMENT NO.:
WITN07760100 Dated: 15
MARCH 2023
POST OFFICE HORIZON IT INQUIRY
FIRST WITNESS STATEMENT OF PHILIP LIGGINS
I, PHILIP LIGGINS, will say as follows:
INTRODUCTION
1. I am a former employee of the Post Office and held the position of Horizon Field
Support Officer (“HFSO”).
2. This witness statement is made to assist the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry (the
“Inquiry”) with the matters set out in the Rule 9 Request dated 19 January 2023
(the “Request’).
BACKGROUND
3. I have been asked to set out my responses to the following requests.
1. Please set out your professional background, including summaries of any
roles you had at the Post Office or ICL Pathway/Fujitsu.
2. Please describe any training and/or instruction you received in relation to
the Horizon IT project and/or your position as an HFSO.
3. Please describe your experiences working as an HSFO, including the
following details:
a. Your responsibilities and a brief description of your average working day;
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b. Any specific requests for support from subpostmasters or complaints that
you consider to be important to the Inquiry’s terms of reference;
c. What resources you had available to you to assist resolving calls for
support and whether they were adequate; and
d. How the HFSOs were managed.
4. In your view, were subpostmasters adequately trained in how to use Horizon?
5. Do you consider that you were able to provide adequate advice and assistance
on Horizon to subpostmasters?
6. Were you aware of any bugs, errors or defects within the Horizon IT system at
the time you were an HSFO?
7. Is there anything else you think the Chair should be aware of relating to the
Horizon IT Project?
In respect of Request 1 I can confirm I was employed by the Royal Navy from 1968
to 1978. Upon leaving the Navy I was employed by West Midlands Passenger
Transport Executive until 1985 when I was made redundant due to the closure of the
Sutton Coldfield bus station.
I started work for the Post Office in April 1987 as a postal officer. I trained at Walsall
for 4/6 weeks and then worked at the Sutton Coldfield main branch until 1996/1997
when I transferred to Lichfield post office as a Post Office clerk.
I joined the Post Office Horizon Team as a HFSO in around February 2000 having
applied for that position. When I applied for that position, I had a history of volunteering
to travel to other post offices to provide temporary cover and he Lichfield post office
was already using the Horizon system and to it seemed a suitable opportunity for me.
I left my role as a HFSO on 4 February 2001 and went
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back to my role as a counter post office clerk in the Lichfield post office. The Post
Office has completed most of the sub post office migrations to Horizon and they
were reducing the numbers of HFSOs.
GRO . Upon returning to work I built up my number of days at
work: working in the administrative office
before it closed down on 30 September 2002. I then transferred back to the
Lichfield post office. I held the post of assistant manager a couple of times for
periods but mostly I held the role of Post Office Clerk until I took voluntary
redundancy aged 57 in 2008.
8. After I left the Post Office I worked on the M6 Toll Road booths for around 6
months before commencing work with Newrose Personnel (“Newrose’”) in 2009.
9. My role with Newrose was to take over the operations of sub post offices on a
temporary basis when the post office suspended or terminated their
arrangements with a sub postmaster until a permanent replacement could be
found or the sub postmaster was reinstated. I worked for Newrose in this capacity
as a post office counter clerk until 2013. In this capacity I worked in quite a few
sub post offices including Mere Heath, West Bromwich, Lazy Hill Adridge, and a
few sub post offices in Oxford. Sometimes I would be required for a few days,
other times I would be required for longer. I recall I was at the West Bromwich
sub post office for around five months for example.
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10. When I left Newrose after around four years in 2013 I went to work with a friend
as a Post Office counter clerk in Trent Valley, Lichfield until June 2018. Since
then, I have been permanently retired.
11. I have never had a role directly with ICL Pathway or Fujitsu.
12. I would like to make it clear that I have not been provided with any documentation
by the Inquiry to accompany the request for me to provide evidence to thelnquiry.
I have not retained any paperwork from my employment by the Post Office or
Newrose. As such, my evidence has been prepared solely from my recollections.
13. In respect of Request 2 I can confirm that I first started to use the Horizon IT
system in around 1992 or 1993 when it was introduced to the Lichfield post office
where I was working as one of a number of counter clerks. The Horizon system
was first installed by the Post Office into its main branches and then ‘rolled out’
to sub post offices at a later stage. We received a couple of days training from
Post Office training staff that came into the Lichfield post office. This training
consisted of supervision of the use of the Horizon system. I found Horizon to be
fairly intuitive to use although it helped that there were five or six clerks in the
Lichfield post office and, if we were unable to quickly work out how to do
something, we could ask each other for help.
14. In around late 2000 / early 2001 I became aware of HFSO roles becoming
available to go into sub post offices to migrate them onto the Horizon system
and to provide initial training on using Horizon. As I have mentioned, at that time
I would go into other post offices to provide cover and as I was already using
Horizon daily it seemed and interesting opportunity and so I applied for the role.
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15. I received two weeks of training at a hotel in Bristol along with around ten to twelve
other Midlands-based HFSOs. The other HFSOs on this training course were also
experienced users of the Horizon system. I believe the training was provided by
Fujitsu but I cannot be certain about this given the passage of time. I assume that
HSFO’s in different regions received the same training. This training involved
showing the HFSOs how to migrate data from paper records on the Horizon system
and how to use the system on a day-to-day basis so that we could demonstrate this
to sub post masters. I recall the training was similar to the training we had received
when the Horizon system was first installed in the Lichfield post office.
16. During my HFSO training there was ongoing assessment throughout the two weeks,
and I recall there was an assessment at the end. The trainers then approved us to
go into sub post offices to migrate the paper records to Horizon and to support the
sub post masters as they learned to use Horizon.
17. During our Horizon training HSFOs were provide with helpline telephone numbers
which we could use for technical support whilst on site in sub post offices and a
telephone number which we were to provide to sub postmasters if they had any
support requirements after HFSOs had moved on to the next sub post office. I
cannot recall whether these were the same or different telephone numbers and I
do not recall ever having the need to call this helpline.
18. This is the only training that I received in the use of Horizon. I cannot comment
whether HSFOs received further training to refresh their knowledge or to update
their knowledge on any Horizon updates. I was only in the post of HFSO for
approximately 12 months.
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19. In respect of Request 3a I can confirm my role as HFSO involved travelling to a
sub post office to migrate their paper records onto Horizon and to help the sub
postmaster to get to grips with using the Horizon system over two to three days
of support.
20. I would be told in advance by a central post office team which sub post offices I
would be visiting a week or two in advance and they would make hotel bookings
for me and other HFSOs. Typically, HFSOs would be booked into the same
accommodation together with our line manager, Mr Phil Cato, and we would each
visit a sub post office in the vicinity of the hotel over 2 to 3 days before moving
onto the next job. HFSOs were provided with a car and the use of a Post Office
credit card to purchase fuel. Mr Cato would visit the HFSOs as we were providing
support to sub post offices to check that everything was in order.
21. On the day of a migration to Horizon I would tend to arrive at the sub post office
between 3pm to 5pm and wait for them to close for the day. Alternatively, a sub
post office would have to close for the day of migration. A Fujitsu engineer would
arrive at around the same time as me and they would install the hardware required
for the sub post office to use the Horizon software.
22. Once the sub post office had closed and once the engineer had finished their work, I
would then take the paper records for that sub post office, check that the figures
balanced and, if so, I would migrate that data across to Horizon. The inputting of the
data from paper records into Horizon would take me in the region of 30 to 90 minutes
each time. If the paper records did not balance, then I could not migrate the data to
Horizon and I would have to come away. I recall that on one instance in a
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sub post office off the A30 near Oakhampton their paper records did not
balance as the cash figure was incorrect by £1,500. In that case the sub
postmaster had to contact their area manager for authority to include new
balancing data into their paper records before I was authorised to proceed to
migrate it on to the Horizon system.
23. To migrate stock and financial balances to the Horizon system I would take all of
the lines of data for the paper records and copy them into Horizon. This data
included things such as cash, stamp quantities by class, postal orders, licences
such as tv or dog licences, utility payments, postal transactions, etc. Sub post
offices typically carried out around 30-40 transaction types compared to around
110 product lines in main branches. Each sub post office’s product lines were
different. Horizon had fields to complete for each product line and the sub post
masters could simply ignore the fields that were not relevant to them.
24. Once I had completed migration of the paper records to Horizon I would print the
Horizon ledger and staple it to the paper ledger that I had copied the data from. I
would then leave this with the sub postmaster so that they had a record of the
successful migration to Horizon. I was not required to keep a copy of those
records and I did not.
25. On the days following migration days I would spend two to three days with each
sub postmaster watching them using the horizon system and assistingltem if they
were having any difficulty so that they could operate it after I had left. My role was
to observe the sub postmaster doing their job, supervise their use of Horizon and
answer any questions they may have as they learned to use Horizon.
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26. I would stay at the sub post office during its opening hours which varied from post
office to post office but they were typically 9am to Spm. At the end of each day we
would check that the ledgers on Horizon balanced. Tlis would be straightforward as
Horizon would identify where it considered there to be a balancing discrepancy. If the
ledgers did not balance straight away, then it would be apparent.
27. I was conscious that the sub post masters may not need to use all of the functions
of Horizon during my time with them depending on the nature of the transactions that
their customers wanted to perform. In quieter moments I would use the time to
demonstrate to sub post masters how to input transactions that they might need to
do at a later date. The Horizon system at that time had the ability to create test entries
that you could use to familiarise yourself with how it worked although I recall this was
later removed from the Horizon system I was using as a counter clerk in the Lichfield
Post Office by around 2003/2004.
28. I operated as a HFSO in the Midlands area but I was not confined to the Midlands.
When required I migrated data onto Horizon and provided support to sub
postmasters in Wales, Cornwall and other places. I never migrated data or provided
support in relation to a main branch post office only sub post offices.
29. In respect of Request 3b I can confirm that I do not recall any specific requests for
support from sub postmasters or complaints that I consider to be important or relevant
to the Inquiry’s terms of reference. Normally, I would leave the sub post office after
two to three days with no issues. The sub post offices that I visited were
predominantly single person operations or occasionally two or three people but not
more than this. They were often in very rural locations and they might be operated by
elderly sub post masters. Occasionally, if I thought that particular sub postmasters
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30.
31.
32.
Wi
may need some simple pointers or reminders on how to operate Horizon I would
leave them with my mobile telephone number in addition to the Post Office
support helpline number. Whenever I did this, I did not receive many calls and
any calls that I did receive occurred in the period shortly after I had visited the
sub post office and these were always quickly resolved.
If I had more serious concerns that a sub postmaster was going to struggle to
operate Horizon I had been told to bring this to the attention of my line manager,
Mr Cato, for him to take whatever steps he considered to be appropriate to provide
additional support.
I was never asked to return to any sub post office after migrating the paper records
to the Horizon system and completing two to three days with the sub postmaster.
Any further support would have been provided via the helpline number that I gave
to the sub postmaster when I left them or as may have been organised by Mr Cato
if I had informed him of a need for further support.
In respect of Request 3c I have mentioned earlier in this staterrent that during my
training I was given a helpline number to call if I had any issues when working as an
HFSO in sub post offices. I do not recall that I ever needed to call it. The HFSOs
were all staying together in the same hotels as we each visited subpost offices. If
any issues had arisen during our days in sub post offices supporting the sub
postmasters as they learned to use Horizon, the HFSOs would share our
experiences in the evenings and this was always sufficient to address any issues
with sub postmasters the following day. HFSOs frequently had our line manager, Mr
Cato, available to us during his visits in the sub post offices and during the evenings
back at our hotel accommodation to assist with any queries that had arisen. If any
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33.
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issues arose during my final day in any sub post office which I could not deal with
I would discuss these with my fellow HFSOs and Mr Cato that evening and call
the sub postmaster with the solution the following day.
In respect of Request 3d my experience of being managed as a HFSO was my
dealings with Mr Cato when he would visit me on site in sub post offices and in
our interactions at the end of the day in our accommodations. I did not have any
formal management meetings or reviews in the year that I was a HFSO.
In respect of Request 4 my view is that some sub postmasters were adequately
trained in how to use Horizon and others may not have been. Often, I left sub post
offices confident that the sub postmaster was capable of operating the Horizon
system. Sub postmasters were often relatively elderly and some did not adjust easily
to moving away from paper-based records. A small number did not wish to have a
new system imposed on them. I recall, in particular, there was a sub postmaster in
rural Pembrokeshire who was 78 years old and had only around 50 customers a
week. The transition to Horizon or any other electronic system was always going to
be challenging for that sub postmaster. The transition to Horizon was also more
difficult in rural locations where the internet connectivity was patchy. I was aware that
in some locations sub postmasters had to occasionally revert to paper-based record
keeping during periods when the Horizon system could not connect to the internet
and then had the task of updating the Horizon records when their connection was
restored. In addition, some product lines were not able to be provided through a sub
post office without a computer including applications that required photo ID such as
passports and also premium bond transactions. As above, whenever I felt that a sub
postmaster might not be equipped to operate the Horizon system when I
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left them I brought this to the attention of Mr Cato for him to make further
arrangements to support them.
35. In respect of Request 5 I do consider that I was able to provide adequate advice
and assistance on Horizon to sub postmasters in the relatively brief time that I spent
with each of them. I have mentioned earlier in this statement I had been using the
Horizon system and its’ predecessor system for a number of years in main post
offices. I had experience of being ‘parachuted’ into sub post offices too. I also
received training geared towards helping me understand how beg to train others
on the use of Horizon and during my training I was given a helpline number to call
if I had any issues when working at a HFSO in sub post offices. I do not recall that
I ever needed to call it. The HFSOs were all staying together in the same hotels as
we each visited sub post offices. If any issues arose during the day we would share
our experiences in the evenings and this was always sufficient to address any
issues the following day.
36.In respect of Request 6 I can confirm that I was not aware of any bugs, errors or
defects within the Horizon IT system at the time I was a HSFO nor was I made
aware of any issues of that type during my training prior to taking on the HFSO
role. When I stopped working as a HSFO in 20011 GRO
and returned to work as a Post Office clerk I would hear stories and
rumours of problems with the Horizon system but, to my knowledge, these did
not affect anyone in the Lichfield branch and at that time I did not know whether
there was any substance to them or not.
37.In respect of Request 7 I think it would be of assistance to the Chair for me to
detail my work with Newrose following my redundancy from the Post Office.
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38. Newrose Personnel are a provider of postal clerking services. Sub postmasters need
to arrange temporary cover for their sub post offices if they are unable to perform
that role, for example if they go on holiday. Another reason why postal clerking
services may be required is if the Post Office suspends a sub postmaster or
terminates their agreement with a sub postmaster.
39. During the period I worked for Newrose I would be placed in sub post offices to operate
them while the sub postmaster had been suspended by the Post Office or ther
agreement with the Post Office had been terminated. There were various reasons why
this might have happened the reason why I was asked to go to any particular sub post
office had no bearing on the performance of my role. In some cases it was apparent to
me that some sub postmasters has been suspended by the Post Office due to
suspected financial irregularities. It was common for the suspended sub postmaster to
be present when I was acting as sub postmaster as they may have had a personal
shop business to operate themselves from the same premises. I would estimate that
around 75% of the post offices that I was sent into by Newrose involved investigation
of financial irregularity and suspicions of dishonesty by the Post Office. This was
sometimes an uncomfortable experience and quite a few of the sub postmasters I was
interacting with at this time bore a considerable amount of ill will to the Horizon system
and the Post Office.
40. Whilst I heard anecdotes of issues with the Horizon system, I did not have direct
experience of this except on one occasion and I was not involved an any
investigation of anyone else’s use of the Horizon system. Throughout the time I
worked with Newrose the conversations I had with suspended sub postmasters
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made me increasingly concerned that the Post Office had not been supporting
their sub postmasters as they should.
41. In 2010 I was asked by Newrose to go into a sub post office at Lazy Hill, Aldridge. I
ran that post office as the sole temporary sub postmaster until a permanent sub
postmaster could be identified by the Post Office. There were no other postal
clerking staff. It was a feature of this particular sub postoffice that it would act as an
agent for Santander Bank account holders. Local pubs would deposit their cash
takings regularly into their Santander Bank accounts via the Lazy Hill sub post office.
42. One day, after I had been acting as the Lazy Hill sub postmaster for around 2
months, the Horizon cash balance at the end of the day was £2,000 short. I
checked the cash entries for Horizon against the cash deposited that day, but I
could not reconcile them. I then called my Newrose manager. Given the passage
of time I cannot recall her name. My manager came to the Lazy Hill sub post office
that night and together we turned the premises upside down looking for any cash
that might account for the discrepancy but could not find it. My manager then
spent approximately one week checking the cash receipts for the day in question
with the customers that had deposited cash that day. She was able to confirm the
receipts matched the deposits made and the discrepancy remained a mystery. I
understood from speaking with the previous Lazy Hill sub postmaster that this
was similar to their experience and the reason why they had been suspended. I
believe that the former sub postmaster was later prosecuted. I cannot recall their
names, but this information should be in the records held by the Post Office.
43. As I was the sub postmaster at the time the discrepancy arose, I was required to
account to Newrose for the £2,000 cash discrepancy and that amount was deducted
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from their payments to me over the next 20 months in equal instalments of £100. This
felt very unfair to me as I had not taken or lost the money and through the
investigations my Manager had carried out Newrose knew this. I was aware
though of the rigorously enforced rule that a sub postmaster must account for any
discrepancy in the financial balances of their sub post office.
44. I did not complain to Newrose about the unfairness of the £2,000 being deducted
from my pay. There was nothing to be gained from doing this. Newrose would have
still insisted that I pay the £2,000 as the Horizon system showed that the cash had
been deposited and I would not have been allocated any further work with Newrose.
Statement of Truth
I believe the content of this statement to be true.
Dated this 15 day of March 2023.
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Index to First Witness Statement of Philip Liggins dated 15 March 2023
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