Angela van den Bogerd was the first witness to be called for the Post Office during the Horizon trial. She was cross-examined on 18 March 2019 and 19 March 2019. You can read Mrs van den Bogerd's witness statement on scribd here or embedded below.
Monday 18 March 2019
Horizon trial day 5: Into the Horizone
Angela van den Bogerd arriving at the High Court this morning |
"Unless I state to the contrary, I would only accept the evidence of Mrs Van den Bogerd and Mr Beal [a senior Post Office colleague] in controversial areas of fact in issue in this Common Issue [sic] trial if these are clearly and uncontrovertibly corroborated by contemporaneous documents."
So we were all ears today. And there were all sorts of revelations.
The MoneyGram duplicate transactions error
There's no doubt Horizon appears to work well for most Subpostmasters most of the time. But that's no comfort to a Subpostmaster on the end of a Horizon error. The Post Office's case is that yes Horizon has errors and yes a small number of them might affect branch accounts, but because of the systems in place and information largely only available to the Post Office, no claimant Subpostmasters have ever had to give money (much less be accused of stealing it) to the Post Office because of a computer error. It would only ever be a user error or fraud. The claimants dispute this strongly, but they have to prove it, in this trial, beyond the balance of probabilities to the judge.
Patrick Green QC |
This afternoon, Patrick Green, QC for the claimants, produced a loaded gun and then for some reason, didn't fire it.
The case is that of Mr Aakash Patny, a claimant who gave evidence last week. Mr Patny had a number of problems with Horizon, all hotly disputed by the Post Office, and one concerned a MoneyGram reversal which Mr Patny performed on 23 February 2016 when a customer wished to send £3,100 abroad, but could not do so when his debit card was declined. What Mr Patny did was cancel the transaction, but in fact the Post Office claims he should have reversed it by calling the Horizon helpline and being taken through the steps to reverse it.
At the end of the day, Mr Patny found he was £6,200 down. He called the helpline and they reversed his £3,100, but he was held liable for the remaining £3,100, which he disputes.
Mr Patny's cross-examination on Wednesday last week was a little confusing. I think it was because the Post Office barrister Simon Henderson didn't seem ready for Mr Patny's explanations of what happened - and, if I might be so bold, seemed a little unclear as to what actually had happened.
Mr Henderson insisted that Mr Patny had followed the wrong procedure in not calling the Helpline to reverse the transaction at the time and he produced a document describing the correct procedure which he asked Mr Patny to agree with.
Mr Henderson then said that Mr Patny called the helpline but did not perform the reversal. Mr Patny said he did - he called the helpline after something called "polling time" which is 7pm, when Horizon rolls over into the next working day. He called after 7pm because until that point he thought he had successfully cancelled the MoneyGram transaction, but then after balancing, he noticed he was £6,200 down. Mr Patny thought this must be the declined transaction which had somehow magically doubled. Mr Patny then said that the Helpline agreed he had a £3,100 reversal which needed performing, but he was then held liable for the other £3,100.
After a brief weird interlude during which Mr Henderson accused Mr Patny of committing a criminal offence over a ludicrous stamp declaration (which Mr Patny said was another Horizon error) we returned to the MoneyGram issue. Mr Henderson said the extra £3,100 was actually £3,694.88 and it was down to a variety of discrepancies caused by user error (quite why he thought the £3,100 couldn't be hidden within that larger number I don't know, but Mr Patny didn't challenge him on it).
Mr Patny was having none of it. He said his area sales manager Mark Irwin came to have a look agreed it was probably a double transaction and actually lobbied the Post Office on his behalf to stop his branch being held liable.
And that was how we left it on Wednesday.
So let's go to today. Patrick Green established with Angela van den Bogerd that the very month Aakash Patny had a problem with his alleged double phantom MoneyGram transaction, there was a problem in the system causing double phantom errors.
The error was caused by a software update from MoneyGram in January 2016 causing "system latency". In MoneyGram's quarterly business review, the error is reviewed and readers are advised
"Duplicate transactions are created in [MoneyGram] systems as a result of Post Office time outs. A joint MG/POL team is working to ascertain impact on settlement and implementation of an appropriate plan of action."
I thought Mr Green was going to suggest that here we had the evidence that a software error affecting Post Office systems was causing duplicate transactions identical to the one Mr Patny was being held liable for. But he didn't instead he said:
Q. It wasn't wildly well advertised to subpostmasters that
this problem was being dealt with at the time?
A. No. People were aware there was an issue, clearly, in
branch and then --
Q. People in the branch had an issue, but they were
probably being blamed for user error, weren't they?
A. Well, they knew there was an issue and they were ringing
into NBSC at the time.
Q. Sorry?
A. They knew there was an issue and they were ringing into
NBSC at the time.
Q. Well they were claiming there was an issue but they
might be met with "This is user error"?
this problem was being dealt with at the time?
A. No. People were aware there was an issue, clearly, in
branch and then --
Q. People in the branch had an issue, but they were
probably being blamed for user error, weren't they?
A. Well, they knew there was an issue and they were ringing
into NBSC at the time.
Q. Sorry?
A. They knew there was an issue and they were ringing into
NBSC at the time.
Q. Well they were claiming there was an issue but they
might be met with "This is user error"?
This to me looked like it was building up to the first clear cut copper-bottomed evidence of a Horizon error which had left a branch Subpostmaster out of pocket, but Mr Green didn't ask Mrs van den Bogerd if she thought that was a possibility. He didn't pull the trigger. I wonder why.
Shonky hardware, shonky software
In the morning session, there were two belters. In fact, during one of them, Karl Flinders from Computer Weekly leaned over to me and whispered "he's just put a 35 yarder in the top right hand corner", which, for those not familiar with sporting idioms, is an Association Football reference meaning "he's done quite well there".
First of all Mrs van den Bogerd is taken to paragraph 13 of her witness statement in which she says she has been made aware of "phantom sales" in Horizon in around 2000, but, crucially, says Mrs van den Bogerd, "they should not cause a discrepancy in a branch's accounts". She then goes on to list how certain mysterious out of hours transactions take place which are either down to user error, standard Horizon processes or fraud.
Mr Green picks up on this and says that if Mrs van den Bogerd was told about phantom sales by a Subpostmaster, she'd assume it was user error. Mrs van den Bogerd agrees.
Mr Green takes Mrs van den Bogerd to something called a master PEAK created in 2001. This is a document "where there are a number of iterations of a problem what Fujitsu do is they pull together a number of PEAKs into a master PEAK to collect the cases of different people who have had the same problem."
It is about a Horizon issue which has been closed without the permission of the Subpostmaster, who is understandably irate. He is £1500 down, he has had to make good the amount and he is now at risk of suspension for refusing to make ongoing discrepancies good. The PEAK notes the Subpostmaster "wants a face-to-face meeting with someone in
authority from [Horizon/Post Office] to discuss the issues. [The Subpostmaster] feels very strongly about this and says he is willing
to take POCL [Post Office Counters Ltd, as was] to a tribunal/court because of the stress he has suffered because of the problems."
So - stressed out Subpostmaster, lots of money at stake and he's hacked off because the complaint was erroneously closed. Mr Green notes that the Subpostmaster had been told it was probably user error.
A month later some Royal Mail engineers go out to have a look (Post Office was still part of Royal Mail in 2001). They see the phantom transactions for themselves.
"Now, pausing there," says Mr Green, "that is independent site visit
corroboration of the problem by Royal Mail's own engineers at the branch, isn't it?
"
Mrs van den Bogerd agrees.
Eventually after lots and lots of to-ing and fro-ing with several Subpostmasters all appearing to have the same problem, it turns out it was a fault with the touch screens which were creating the phantom entries.
Mrs van den Bogerd agrees this is clearly a hardware error affecting multiple branches.
But we see from the PEAK that the official resolution is to refuse to acknowledge the problem as a Horizon error as user error could not be precluded from it. So the stressed out Subpostmaster presumably got a new touch screen, but he didn't get his money back.
Mr Green then leaped forward 10 years to a software error reported in another PEAK dated February 2011 which showed negative stock items which the Post Office branch in question didn't even sell.
"The office went into the declaration and confirmed it showed the PO saving stamps and other stock items, some showing as minus stock amounts, that were not correct to the branch.... it somehow seems that the system has somehow picked up this declaration and this is the cause of the discrepancies appearing on the system. The SPMR was told to declare the correct stock figures but is reluctant to do this as this will cause discrepancies when she next balances that are not relevant to herself."Serious stuff.
Mrs van den Bogerd agreed this was an example of a software error on Horizon.
Let's end with an internal Post Office email exchange!
The first email is dated 9 Dec 2013, and is from the Helpline team to the branch support team (which Mrs van den Bogerd was part of). The helpline team email starts:
"Branch reporting that he has found sensitive issue with Horizon when the system put a phantom cheque on the cheque line in July 2013. Claims to have evidence to support his claim.... Although he himself did not suffer a loss, thinks that Horizon is flawed. Did not ask to be contacted about this. Just wanted to say that he had this information and threatened to go to MP as a result."
Nigel Allen from the branch support team sends it up to Andy Winn saying: "Given the current media and in particular the BBC's attention on Horizon, do you think it is worthwhile looking into this 'alleged flaw' with Horizon that this SPMR has highlighted to preempt any enquiries from his MP?"
The response comes back from Mr Winn:
"There is nothing I can investigate given the level of detail provided unless he only accepted one cheque in July 13. Even then I don't have the level of detail needed and would need Fujitsu support. Without a date/value we can't really raise a request. I don't really understand what the purpose of the call is. Does he want it investigated or not? My instinct is that we have enough on with people asking us to look at things. I can't figure out how if a phantom cheque appeared on Horizon he could avoid a loss unless another phantom transaction took it away again!!!!"
Interesting. Mrs van den Bogerd is asked what she thinks of this email exchange. Would it not be useful to be a little bit curious about a potential Horizon error? Maybe ask for the evidence? Mrs van den Bogerd agrees this is a "totally inadequate response." Mr Green says " And the point about that is that shows, red in tooth and claw, that if a phantom cheque comes up into your account you're going to suffer a loss, aren't you?"
Mrs van den Bogerd agrees that is what Mr Winn is saying.
Mrs van den Bogerd continues to give evidence tomorrow.
*****************************
Please feel free to forward the link to this blog post. The more people who read it, the more people find out about what is the biggest trial going through the UK courts right now.
Please also consider a donation to keep the postofficetrial.com website going by choosing an amount and clicking the button at the bottom of this post. Contributors who donate £20 or more will be added to this secret email list. Thanks!
Horizon Trial: Day 5 transcript
This is the unperfected transcript of the fifth day of the Horizon trial, held on 18 March 2019 in court 26 of the High Court's Rolls Building. It is the first day of cross-examination of Angela van den Bogerd, a witness found to have deliberately misled the court during her evidence at the Common Issues trial.
Monday, 18 March 2019
(10.30 am)
Housekeeping
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, good morning. It is my turn
to be leading evidence. There are a few housekeeping
matters for me to raise with your Lordship and there
might be some your Lordship would like to raise with me.
My points for your Lordship. On Day 2 Mr Latif and
Mr Tank gave evidence. Your Lord will recall that
Mr Latif referred to some memo views that he received in
January 2018. My Lord, those have now been found and
disclosed.
My Lord, secondly in relation to Mr Latif there was
a reference to an audit that was done at his branch, the
Caddington branch. That audit report has now been
disclosed and indeed it is now in the trial bundles.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are any of the memo views in the trial
bundles?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Not yet, my Lord. They were found and
disclosed over the weekend.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are they going in, do you know?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, my expectation is that they will
go in unless --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I in particular would like to look for
and look at at least one or two of them, so ...
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes.
My Lord, Mr Tank, your Lordship will recall that he
was shown a Horizon Online quick reference guide and
suggested he had never seen a document like that before,
the version he was used to was much shorter. The
reference guide which was in force at the time of the
events in question had already been disclosed but it is
now in the bundle, my Lord, at {F/691.1}.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And that's the one that was in force at
the time Mr Tank --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes. It is dated 11 August -- I say
dated, when it was disclosed it was disclosed with the
date 11 August 2010.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And that I think related to a passage of
evidence where I observed that the court had seen
a different version of the reference guide.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, I think your Lordship had seen
perhaps a shorter one in the common issues trial. This
is the long version. There is no real, as far as I can
see, substantive difference between the one that was put
to Mr Latif and the one that's now in the bundles.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Does that deal with all your
housekeeping?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Those are mine, my Lord.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, do you have any?
MR GREEN: My Lord, there is the Royal Mail application in
the background but I don't want to trouble your Lordship
with it now.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That is something on my list and I would
like to raise it now, not in respect of that but in
respect of the correspondence at the end of last week.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr De Garr Robinson, obviously you know
about this because you communicated it to the court as
soon as you found out.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: My understanding and do correct me if
I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure that this is correct, is
that what the court was told on Thursday about the
Royal Mail have the E&Y pre-2011 audit reports and being
unwilling to disclose them was incorrect, is that
a correct understanding?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes, subject to this
important clarification. My Lord, there had been --
there's a confusion on my side of the court. Audit
related documents had been requested from Royal Mail and
Royal Mail had indicated that they were reluctant to
provide anything without the protection of a court
order. Then the confusion was that it was thought that
the audit related documents that had been requested and
had met with that response were the actual audit reports
prior to 2011 and that was the mistake and that was not
the case. There had not actually been a discussion with
Royal Mail about those specific documents, which is why
it's only right that my instructing solicitors have
apologised to Freeths and I have apologised to
your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes. The situation vis-à-vis the
Royal Mail seems to me to fall into two categories, one
of which we can come on to deal with later, the other
one of which I want to deal with now.
The part we can come on to deal with later relates
to the third party disclosure application that I made an
order in respect of on Thursday and you have now
confirmed my understanding. There are some documents
that the Royal Mail has relating to audit in respect of
which an order may prove to be necessary. That
tributary can meander along or not in line with the
proper procedure in the CPR which was initiated at the
end of last week. I assume that that application was
served in accordance with my order.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes. I think the deadline for service
is today.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The second point is the actual pre-2011
Ernst & Young reports. My updated understanding of that
derives solely from what I was told last week, the
letter of correction from Freeths on 15 March and what
you have told me and it seems to me that the position is
as follows, that the Post Office still has not disclosed
those reports because it does not believe it has got
them, is that correct?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, it hasn't been able to find them.
It has looked for them and not been able to find them,
my Lord.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I am therefore going to order a witness
statement please from your solicitors and I'm just going
to identify what that witness statement has to deal
with, because at the moment it seems know there is a bit
too much generalism in these letters of explanation that
say "The Post Office believed" or "The Post Office asked
for", so I'm going to condescend to particulars. I'm
just going to read out what the witness statement -- and
we will come on to the time and date that this has to be
served at the end of this little passage.
I would like a witness statement from the
Post Office, and I imagine that will be from Mr Parsons,
which deals with the following: 1, the steps taken by
reference to the specific individuals who have
instructed or directed those steps, in order to obtain
copies of the pre-2011 Ernst & Young reports; 2, if
those steps have led to a conclusion that the
Post Office does not have those reports in its custody,
possession or control, an explanation as to how that can
be the case; 3, identification of what requests, if any,
have been made to Ernst & Young before today's date --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Does your Lordship mean Royal Mail?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, I have just said identification of
what requests have been made by the Post Office --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: To?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: To Ernst & Young, who produced them,
before today to obtain copies of those reports.
4, exactly the same in respect of Royal Mail, in
other words identification of what requests have been
made to Royal Mail. 5, if no such requests have been
made either to Ernst & Young and/or Royal Mail, an
explanation of how that comes to be the case. And then
6, which is effectively the catch-all, which is a copy
please of an immediate request that will be made today
in writing to Ernst & Young and to the Royal Mail for
copies of these documents.
Now, just pausing there, the explanation for that,
Mr De Garr Robinson -- and I know I don't have to give
the explanation for your purposes, but just to be
clear -- I can't conceive of a situation whereby copies
of those reports are not available in this litigation.
If for some reason due to the corporate reorganisation
in 2011 it is the case that they are unavailable, well,
then steps are going to have to be taken to produce
them.
I would like that order drawing up today please.
Would you like to tell me of a suitable time and date by
which that witness statement has to be -- or ought to be
provided?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, could I glance back and take
instructions?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Of course you can.
(Pause).
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Would your Lordship be happy with
10.30 on Thursday morning?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I am happy, subject to the following
observation: depending on what the outcome is, it may be
necessary to recall witnesses in respect of this,
but for the moment 10.30 on which ..?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Thursday morning.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I'm going to make it 9.30 on Thursday
morning so that if there's anything arising out of it it
can be dealt with on Thursday morning. So that is the
21st.
Right, so that's that. There are a range of other
housekeeping type matters but they can all wait until
the end of today.
Right, so ...
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I call Angela van den Bogerd.
MS ANGELA VAN DEN BOGERD (affirmed)
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do have a seat, Mrs Van den Bogerd,
please.
Examination-in-chief by MR DE GARR ROBINSON
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Mrs van den Bogerd, there will be file
that you have in front of you. Could I ask you to go to
tab 5 of that file please and you will see on the first
page of the document in front of you is a witness
statement that is said to be made by you. Is that your
name and address on page 1 of that statement? {E2/5/1}
A. Yes, it's mine.
Q. If I could ask you to go to the last page of the same
tab, page 44 {E2/5/44}, is that your signature?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And still in the same bundle I would like you to go
please to what I hope is tab 16 {E4/16/1}.
A. Tab 16?
Q. Yes.
A. Empty.
Q. It is empty.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It might be at the front of the tab.
That's where mine was.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: If I could ask you to go back to
tab 5, Mrs van den Bogerd. I'm misleading you horribly,
I do apologise. Is there a series of corrections to
your statement at the front?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you seen those corrections before?
A. Yes, I have.
Q. Subject to those corrections, is this witness statement
true to the best of your knowledge, recollection and
belief?
A. It is.
Q. You will be asked some questions now, if you could wait
there.
Cross-examination by MR GREEN
MR GREEN: I think the statement on the screen is the one
from the column issues trial, so probably the one we
want up is {E2/5/1} please.
Mrs van den Bogerd, this is a statement that you
made in November 2018, isn't it?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And if you look at page 44 {E2/5/44}, it is signed on
16 November 2018?
A. That's correct.
Q. Can we go to page 2 of that statement please {E2/5/2}.
Now, at paragraph 5 you will see there you have
explained a common theme in your responses in this
witness statement and you say that the common theme:
"... is that the evidence put forward by the
claimants does not concern a bug, defect or error in
Horizon (ie a Horizon generated shortfall as defined in
paragraph 41.6 of Post Office's generic defence)."
And then you say this:
"They often appear to assume that alleged losses,
shortfalls or other problems must have been caused by
Horizon."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. So that's a part of the common theme of your witness
statement, isn't it?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And then you say:
"Given the unspecific nature of many of the
allegations made and that some relate to things that are
said to have occurred years ago, it is not now possible
in this statement for me (and may not be possible for
anyone else) to definitively state what may or may not
have happened in each case."
And then you say:
"Instead, my evidence aims to give the court
a balanced view of the range of possible causes behind
each allegation ..."
Now, was that your aim in November 2018, to give
the court a balanced view?
A. It was, yes.
Q. Do you feel you have succeeded?
A. Well, I made some references and set out alternative
explanations to causes of the losses.
Q. So you feel you did broadly succeed, do you?
A. Broadly.
Q. And then you explain the reason for that. You say:
"... because I believe that, assuming the basic
facts alleged by the claimants are true, there is
a plausible and much more likely explanation than the
problem being caused by Horizon."
And you say:
"The most common alternative explanation is that
there may have been an accounting mistake or a user
error by the subpostmaster, his assistants or
Post Office."
Correct?
A. Correct.
Q. There is one particular example we will come to where
you say it is a data entry error by Post Office, but it
is fair to say, isn't it, that broadly your witness
statement is actually pointing to the likelihood of
errors made by subpostmasters or their assistants?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, you have made some corrections which we've got in
the document that you were referred to and can we just
look at the types of corrections you have made. There
are some corrections which relate to matters that you
probably realised some time ago. If we look at
paragraph 128 of your witness statement on page
{E2/5/30}. Just to give you context, this is in the
passage that begins on page 28 dealing with Pam Stubbs'
case and if we go back to page 30 and look at
paragraph 128 you see there it says:
"The FSC customer account (ie the record of all
branch discrepancies, TCs, credits and debits on the
subpostmaster's account) confirms that Mrs Stubbs chose
to settle ..."
Is what you originally said:
"... this shortfall centrally and so this does not
appear to be a problem with Horizon as I would expect
Mrs Stubbs to dispute this shortfall if Horizon was
thought to be the cause."
Yes?
A. That's correct.
Q. Now, taking it in stages, let's just look carefully if
you can first of all at two aspects of what you have
chosen to correct now. If we look at -- I'm sorry we're
going to have to go back between the documents because
we haven't got it all in one place, but if we look at
{E2/16/4} and the second box down relates to
paragraph 128 of your witness statement, doesn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's the paragraph we have just been looking at
and what you now say is that Mrs Stubbs settled this
shortfall centrally, full stop.
A. Yes.
Q. And you have deleted:
"... and so this does not appear to be a problem
with Horizon as I would expect Mrs Stubbs to dispute
this shortfall if Horizon was thought to be the cause."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And you must have realised that -- at the latest you
must have realised that that correction was necessary
after the common issues trial and you had heard her
evidence?
A. Yes.
Q. And the reason it was necessary -- two important points
of correction there. The first one is that the words
"chose to settle" are very misleading, aren't they, in
the context of accepting the transaction correction?
A. Yes. Because she did actually dispute it via the
contracts (inaudible), which I didn't know.
Q. Well, yes, let's take it in stages. There are two
different points. The phrase "chose to settle
centrally", the choice is pay or settle centrally
effectively, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And there's no dispute button, as we have already
established in the previous trial. So there's no
dispute button on Horizon and that's why you have
amended what you previously said, that she chose to
central centrally, you have taken the word "chose" out
because it is not a real choice for the subpostmaster,
is it?
A. So the reason I took it out here is because when I wrote
this I said she chose to settle it because she didn't
dispute it at the time and that's why I wrote it as
I did. What I subsequently found is that she did
dispute, albeit later, so therefore it was incorrect, as
I had stated.
Q. Right, well, I will take it quite quickly because we
have already dealt with this in the previous trial but
the short point is however much you dispute something,
the maximum you can do on Horizon to dispute it is to
press "settle centrally"?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, that's an example of a correction you have made
from something you would have known a long time ago.
There's another one at paragraph 145 of your witness
statement on page {E2/5/33}. This relates to
Mr Abdulla's case. You see paragraph 145 there?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. This is talking about transaction corrections in the sum
of £1,092 for two consecutive months and you will
remember that in fact what we found was there were in
fact three successive entries of 1,092 on the
spreadsheet, weren't there?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you remember? So what you have done is you have
corrected the word "over" in the fourth line down just
after "relevant" to "under" and you have nonetheless
decided to maintain Post Office's position that although
there were three identical items, month after month, for
£1,092, it's only the third one that was in error?
A. Yes.
Q. So you don't accept that the second one was in error?
A. No.
Q. So the second one is a coincidence, two 1,092. The
third coincidence is a coincidence too far, is that
right, because that's the one you corrected?
A. So the first two were the same figure for two months.
Q. Two months running.
A. Yes. And the third one was issued mistakenly and that's
why the correcting TC was issued to correct that, from
the evidence then there's two on there that should
stand.
Q. I see, and so that's a correction of the word but not
the outcome in terms of where you would lay the blame
for that?
A. Yes, that's correct.
Q. And then the other sort of correction we've got is
corrections of evidence that you have only recently
heard -- you were in court, weren't you, for the
evidence of Angela Burke?
A. I was, but actually for Angela Burke I had already made
that correction to my solicitors before I heard that
evidence.
Q. So hold on a second, you had already decided to make the
correction you have made in relation to Angela Burke
before she gave evidence?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. But let's just have a look at that, if we may.
So it is paragraph 104 of your witness statement, which
is {E2/5/25} and there you are dealing with the fact
that there were two other items left in the stack.
A. Correct.
Q. And it says, four lines up from the bottom:
"Mrs Burke did not do this [ie clear the stack] and
bundled together two customers' transactions into one
basket ... from Horizon's perspective this would have
looked like a set of transactions relevant to a single
customer."
Yes?
A. Yes and that's still correct.
Q. And the addition that you have made, if I can just read
it out, it is -- thank you very much, very efficient.
We can see the addition that you have made on
paragraph 104 at the bottom {E2/16/3}.
A. Yes.
Q. "However this had no bearing on the failed recovery of
the £150 cash withdrawal."
A. That's correct.
Q. Now, did you think it was odd then that Mrs Burke was
extensively cross-examined on the basis of your evidence
that you had already decided required modification?
A. So my understanding of the way that Mrs Burke was
cross-examined was that that was not actually put to her
in those words but that Mr Draper did say to her that he
understood that that didn't have a bearing on the 150,
that's my recollection.
Q. Let's take it in stages. We've got the reference to the
transcripts, but very briefly, the point that was being
made to Mrs Burke was if you leave transactions in the
stack for longer you are leaving a longer period during
which an error might occur in relation to that basket.
A. And that is --
Q. That's the thrust of it.
A. And that is correct, yes.
Q. But the point was completely obvious from her own
witness statement on a fair reading of it, that it was
the last transaction that had gone astray so it had no
bearing whatever, did it?
A. In this situation it didn't because it was a failed
recovery.
Q. And you accept that your original witness statement as
drafted did not make clear that you were not suggesting
that any error by her had any effect on it?
A. That's correct. When I put my witness statement
together I did say that I hadn't done all the detail
I would ordinarily have done, I didn't have as much time
to do that and I have looked at other evidence in
relation to Mrs Burke and what was very clear to me is
that Mrs Burke had done absolutely nothing wrong in that
situation.
Q. You didn't say that, did you? The reason I'm asking
this a little bit carefully is because you introduce
your witness statement and focus on the likely reason
being user error and that's the tenor of what we're then
expecting to read about?
A. Yes.
Q. So when you don't point out she has done absolutely
nothing wrong, the natural way of reading your witness
statement is that she had done something wrong in some
way?
A. I agree, which is why --
Q. And that's why you have corrected it now?
A. Absolutely, yes.
Q. But it was completely clear from her witness statement,
wasn't it, that it was the last transaction that failed?
A. Yes.
Q. And the reason it was clear was she actually exhibited
a copy of the receipt so when you looked at her witness
statement there was an exhibit with a copy of the
receipt and you could see it was the last transaction?
A. Yes.
Q. Then if we just look at the change made to paragraph 72
please, back one page on that document on Opus
{E2/16/2}, this is in relation to Mr Patny and his
difficulties with MoneyGram:
"Mr Patny is correct that on 23 February 2016 he
processed a MoneyGram transaction for £3,100 and the
customer's debit card payment for the transaction was
declined by the customer's bank. At this point the
transaction was committed and could not be removed from
the stack, therefore Mr Patny had to settle to cash.
Process is that the MoneyGram transaction should have
been cancelled on Horizon followed by a reversal of the
transaction. The data shows that Mr Patny cancelled the
transaction, however did not complete the reversal.
This would result in the £3,100 loss."
Now, what you said at the time was a little more
doubtful, you just recite what he is saying he did
rather than accepting it.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. And --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can I just ask you to pause there just
for a technical reason. I have been working off the
hard copy of Mrs van den Bogerd's corrections, which
seems to be different to the one that's on the common
screen. Are there two different versions?
Mrs van den Bogerd, the clip of documents which
Mr De Garr Robinson took you to, is that three sheets in
length?
A. It is three sheets I have in front of me.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It is three sheets?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can we just scroll to the end of
{E2/16/4} and see how many pages long that is.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I'm using the one that is the common one
for all witnesses. We have one for each witness and --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's a perfect explanation. As long
as there is only one version of the document.
MR GREEN: There is only one version.
Because what you actually said in your witness
statement was that you were assuming the facts that the
claimants alleged were true.
A. Yes.
Q. And it is only after hearing Mr Patny's evidence and the
fact that the helpline did tell him to settle to cash
that you have changed this, isn't it?
A. No, so again my corrections were made in advance of the
claimants giving their evidence last week. So I put
this in to my solicitors before the trial started.
Q. Right, so we have only found out about it after they
have been cross-examined?
A. Yes.
Q. I see.
A. I did put it in before.
Q. I understand, thank you very much.
Can we move on to the first section in your witness
statement please where you respond briefly to points
made by Mr Henderson. Now, you were familiar with
Mr Henderson's role with Second Sight?
A. I was.
Q. You were the programme director of the branch support
programme?
A. Correct.
Q. You were involved in preparing reports in response to
Second Sight?
A. Correct.
Q. You were involved in decisions about what information
was provided to Second Sight?
A. Correct.
Q. And at paragraph 9 of your witness statement on
{E2/5/3}, you say:
"At paragraph 2.4, Mr Henderson says that he
analysed some transaction data provided to him. I do
not know what transaction data he is referring to or
what he means by him being able to 'reverse engineer'
this data."
Now, paragraph 2.4 says that he was provided the
information by Mr Jenkins, Gareth Jenkins, in his
witness statement?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. You know who Mr Gareth Jenkins is, don't you?
A. I know who he is, yes.
Q. Have you ever met him?
A. No.
Q. Because there are quite a lot of references in the
Fujitsu witnesses' witness statements in particular to
Mr Jenkins, aren't there?
A. Yes, that's correct.
Q. And particularly in Mr Godeseth's witness statement?
A. Yes, I understand.
Q. And you in turn refer to Mr Godeseth's witness statement
in your witness statement?
A. I do.
Q. Did you make any requests for clarity from Mr Jenkins
about what that transaction data was if it was provided
by Fujitsu?
A. No, I didn't.
Q. Because presumably Post Office would have had to agree
for Fujitsu to provide it if it was to Second Sight?
A. So I wasn't involved in all of that as part of the
programme. I was aware that Mr Henderson had met with
Gareth Jenkins, but I wasn't fully aware of all the
detail of that at the time.
Q. Okay. Let's move on to transactions outside working
hours. That's on {E2/5/3}, paragraph 12 of your witness
statement and you would agree on the face of it, if
Mr Henderson was concerned about transactions outside
working hours that that's a reasonable thing for him to
be at least interested and curious about, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. On the face of it?
A. Yes.
Q. And paragraph 13 of your witness statement gives what
you explain are a number of plausible and legitimate
explanations which you set out below, do you see that?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. First line. {E2/5/4} and you say:
"For the sake of clarity, I categorically confirm
that I am not aware of any improper conduct by
Post Office or Fujitsu like this, or of any reason why
Post Office or Fujitsu would engage in such conduct.
I am informed by Post Office's solicitors that in the
course of investigating this matter ..."
So that's for this trial, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. "... Fujitsu have advised that 'phantom sales' were
reported in around 2000 which appeared to be caused by
hardware issues."
Now, pausing there, were you aware prior to being
told that in relation to these proceedings that there
had been phantom sales problems on the Horizon system?
A. Not that I can recall.
Q. So if a postmaster had said that to you at the time,
prior to this litigation, you would have assumed it was
actually more likely to be user error, is that fair?
A. I would have and then an issue would have been raised
and would have been investigated from the Horizon logs
to see what was there.
Q. And it is fair that you explain you have had quite a lot
of experience looking into discrepancies with
subpostmasters?
A. I have.
Q. So it's against the background of that experience that
you nonetheless weren't aware of even the existence of
a problem with phantom sales having happened?
A. Yes, that's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can you just give me an approximate
either month or year when you became aware of phantom
sales?
A. I don't recall, my Lord, the approximate year.
I mean -- so when I got involved with the mediation
scheme that's probably when we started to hear claims of
phantom transactions and that's -- when we investigated
some of those claims and we could see no evidence of
that throughout that, so that would have been a few
years back. I can't remember exactly when.
Q. Just to make sure I correctly heard your answer, you
investigated and you could see no evidence of that?
A. So I can't remember exactly -- so when we were doing the
mediation scheme then we had people saying to us they
were phantom sales. Some of the mediation ones that
I looked into is, as I set out in here, when we have
looked into that it was transactions being done after
the system had automatically logged somebody off, so if
they had been dormant for 59 minutes it would actually
complete what was in the basket and produce the receipt
and one of the instances I can remember was that was
after they had closed the branch and that they thought
that was a phantom transaction and we could explain that
from the evidence on the transaction logs to how that
happened.
Q. Just going back, just looking at paragraph 13 again,
four lines down on the right-hand side:
"I am informed by Post Office's solicitors that in
the course of investigating this matter, Fujitsu have
advised that 'phantom sales' were reported in around
2000 ..."
So that information appears to have come to you for
the first time from Post Office's solicitors, is that
right?
A. Yes, I wasn't aware that we had had phantom sales in
2000. I wasn't aware of that.
Q. So up until that point you would have assumed it was
user error?
A. Yes, I would have.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at the phrase that
you have used, "plausible and legitimate explanations".
If you focus on paragraph 13 for a second, you see that
after the bit about phantom sales having been reported
"which appeared to be caused by hardware issues" it
says:
"This is dealt with in the witness statement of
Fujitsu's Steve Parker, but I understand the key point
to be that such matters, provided they relate to stock
sales, should not cause a discrepancy in a branch's
accounts."
Now, pausing there, are you saying that a phantom
stock sale is a plausible and legitimate explanation for
a phantom transaction? What are you saying exactly
there?
A. So if stock -- so say stamps had been put into the
basket and it wasn't by the user, then that's what I'm
referring to in terms of a phantom sale, so it would be
put in as if it was being sold and hadn't been sold.
Q. But what if the stamps were self-declaring without input
from the user? That's a bit of a problem, isn't it, if
you're the subpostmaster?
A. Yes.
Q. If a ridiculous value of stamps was self-declaring, it's
not the stock you've got, that's a big problem for the
subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. It would be in that -- putting into the stack, yes.
Q. Okay. Let's have a look if we may at the phantom sales
master PEAK. Now, you know what a master PEAK is, don't
you?
A. The main one.
Q. It is the main -- where there are a number of iterations
of a problem what Fujitsu do is they pull together
a number of PEAKs into a master PEAK to collect the
cases of different people who have had the same problem?
A. Yes.
Q. And let's look please at {F/97}. This is the master
PEAK for phantom sales, PEAK number 0065021, dated
17 April 2001. That's when it is actually initiated in
the main box and the target date in the PEAK you will
see is the 13 June 2001, do you see that?
A. I do.
Q. Have you seen this PEAK before?
A. Not that I recall.
Q. So --
A. I certainly didn't see this back in 2001.
Q. So there are a number of different FAD codes for
different SPMs in this PEAK, but can we just look -- is
there any way we could slightly increase the size of the
text?
A. Thank you.
Q. Mrs van den Bogerd, can you see that all right?
A. I can, yes.
Q. That's perfect, thank you very much.
So if we just look at 14/04/01 at the top there, do
you see:
"New complaint call as previous ... closed WITHOUT
permission from PM."
Do you see that?
A. I see that.
Q. And the reason that "WITHOUT" is in capitals is because
the call shouldn't be closed without the agreement of
the subpostmaster; that's right, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the next one done:
"PM wishing to complaint about ongoing system
problems, see call 0104 [et cetera] ... for details."
Then:
"PM had previous complaint open ... that PM was
under impression (correctly) that it could only be
closed with his permission. It would appear Ki Barnes
gave authorisation to close that call. PM VERY unhappy
about this."
Do you see that?
A. I do.
Q. Then the next one down, 12.58:
"Information: PM extremely unhappy about the
problems with his counters. He says he has had to pay
out over £1,500 in losses that are due to these
problems. He has informed POCL ..."
Post Office Counters Limited, which was then the
name of the Post Office, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "He has informed POCL they can suspend him because he is
refusing to make good any further losses."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "PM wants a face-to-face meeting with someone in
authority from Pathway/POCL to discuss the issues.
PM feels very strongly about this and says he is willing
to take POCL to a tribunal/court because of the stress
he has suffered because of the problems."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Then halfway down the page you can see "JULIAN HALL", in
capitals, and:
"Information: THIS CALL IS ONLY TO BE CLOSED WITH
THE EXPRESS PERMISSION OF JULIAN HALL."
Who is this particular subpostmaster who seems to be
one of the main complaints in this PEAK, yes? And
that's the correct procedure, it shouldn't be closed
without his position, yes?
A. That is the correct procedure, yes.
Q. Then 14/04/01:
"PM has lost all confidence in system and Ki Barnes
as he feels she has misled him over previous calls."
Then underneath that:
"The system seems to lose transaction and PM is
concerned that for every transaction error he notices
there is the probability that there are ones he misses,
leading to discrepancies. The PM is at present finding
the whole scenario very stressful and is suffering
sleepness nights due to these problems. In the light of
what has gone on the PM is prepared to break his
contractual obligations with POCL and refuse to pay any
more discrepancies and will take legal action if
required."
So it is clear, isn't it, here that before we get
into the detail about what the root cause is, which we
will come to in a moment, the PM has had a call closed
wrongly that should not have been closed.
A. Yes.
Q. Is extremely distressed about it, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And there are significant sums of money involved?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that fair? And you can understand why it's a fair
complaint to make about Ki Barnes that she has
authorised the closure of a complaint that should not
have been closed; that's fair?
A. That is fair.
Q. Right, let's look at what we find under 17/04/01 at
9.48:
"Contacted: I have left a message on Ki Barnes
voicemail as the PM is now complaining about her. I was
speaking to her about the last complaint call and we
both feel that this PM is complaining unjustly. She has
been in contact with him and I feel he is complaining
because the feedback has been advising it is user error,
whereas the PM thinks it is software."
Now, pausing there, let's leave to one side for
a moment the PM supposedly complaining unjustly, it is
clear from this that the feedback the subpostmaster is
getting is that this is user error, yes?
A. From -- yes, yes.
Q. And the PM thinks it is software?
A. Yes.
Q. So this is a good example of the competition which you
have referred to in your witness statement --
A. Yes.
Q. -- of the subpostmaster saying it is software and
effectively what appears to be the feedback he is
getting that it is user error?
A. Yes.
Q. The fact that the feedback says it is user error, do you
think that might have contributed to the closing of the
call by Ki Barnes, or is that not in your experience?
You may not be able to answer.
A. No, it would depend on whether other investigations had
taken place.
Q. Okay. Let's have a look. If we go down to the bottom
of this page, 10.17:
"As I was on the phone to the PM, he advised that
three first class stamps that were on the screen just
'dropped off'. PM had three first class stamps ..."
A. Sorry, I have lost that.
Q. I'm so sorry, it is just at the bottom there. Just
under "Contacted".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Hold on one second. We have just jumped
down to the second part but it is the same page.
I shared your slight concern we had gone somewhere else.
Can you now see the entry?
A. I can see that now, thank you.
MR GREEN: So you see "Contacted" there.
A. Yes.
Q. "As I was on the phone to the PM, he advised that three
first class stamps that were on the screen just 'dropped
off'."
That's while he is actually on the phone he is
reporting something that appears to happen either during
the telephone call or had just happened:
"PM had 3 first class stamps and other stamps for
30p. When the other stamps 30, went on, the first class
stamps disappeared. They have since put the 3 first
class stamps again. The first transaction (that
disappeared) was put on as 2 first class stamps and
1 normal first class stamp."
And the transaction IDs follow. So he is clearly
having a problem with the stamps.
If we go on to the next page of this PEAK {F/97/2}
you will see there:
"PM advises that the transactions taken after this
one ... which basically skips out transaction
[number 77]. We were unable to find out the transaction
ref of the 1 first class stamp that was taken with the
2 ... can SSC please investigate why he has had
disappearing transactions again and perhaps
a recommendation as to what action can be taken."
Now, there is quite a lot of content in this and I'm
just going to take you to a couple of points if I may.
Let's go forward to page 4 of this PEAK please {F/97/4}
and about halfway down, just more about two-thirds of
the way down, about an inch below the Dell on the side
of the screen can you see 01/05/01, 9.36?
A. Yes.
Q. This is actually a different FAD number. It says:
"PM wants to speak to someone face-to-face and is
fed up with things getting passed back and forth to and
from different departments and nothing ever happening.
PM is willing to travel if he has to in order to speak
to someone face-to-face."
So we have had Mr Hall wanting to speak to someone
face-to-face and we appear to have a different
subpostmaster wanting to speak face-to-face. You will
have encountered, won't you, in your experience when
these problems happen subpostmasters just eventually get
to a point where they get fed up with dealing with the
helpline and they just want to talk to someone
face-to-face to get it sorted out?
A. Yes.
Q. And that doesn't always happen, does it, when they want
to and some of them get quite frustrated?
A. And I can understand that frustration, yes.
Q. Let's look at page 5 please --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Just before you -- are you moving off
that one?
MR GREEN: I am.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: A little bit further down,
Mrs van den Bogerd, there's an entry -- I just wondered
if you understood what it is and if you don't, please
don't worry. There's an entry 1 May 2001 at 10.56, do
you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It says:
"Information: ROMEC are contacting the site to let
them know that they will be attending site ... to fit
suppressors and double sheet flyleads, in order to help
the enviromental fault."
Do you know what ROMEC do?
A. ROMEC were Royal Mail engineers --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Royal Mail engineers?
A. In-house electricians and engineers.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, thank you very much.
Mr Green.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I was just about to pick up --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's fine.
MR GREEN: If we look at page 5 of this PEAK {F/97/5}, if we
go down to the bottom do you see 3 May 2001?
A. Which time?
Q. 15.34.
A. Yes.
Q. So:
"ROMEC have been to site and have done all they can
do. There is no more UKSS2 can do for this site."
What is UK SS2?
A. I'm sorry, I don't know.
Q. Not sure. And then underneath that, 04/05:
"Information: Ki Barnes has called in. I am unsure
as to what to do with this call now. ROMEC [which is
Royal Mail engineers] have been to site and state that
they have actually seen the phantom transactions, so it
is not just the PM's word now. They have fitted
suppressers to the kit ..."
Which is the reference his Lordship took you to:
"... but the PM is still having problems. As yet
there has been no recurrence to the phantom transaction
but there still may be problems."
Now, pausing there, that is independent site visit
corroboration of the problem by Royal Mail's own
engineers at the branch, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. That's clearly not user error any more?
A. No.
Q. Let's look at page 7 {F/97/7}, and if we go down to
19 June 2001 at 3.17, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "I now have pressing evidence to suggest that unwanted
peripheral input is occurring, the likely source being
the screen.
"This has been seen at Old Isleworth ... and
Wawne ... with OI being the best site; when the PM has
been asked to leave the screen on overnight I have
observed system activity corresponding to screen presses
happening with no corresponding evidence of either
routine system activity or human interference ..."
So on the face of it there's unwanted peripheral
input occurring into the system?
A. Yes.
Q. Can we go to page 9 {F/97/9}, top of page 9,
7 August 2001 please, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Halfway across "Repeat call":
"PM Mr Julian Hall back online - has just been
speaking to Becky - insists that he would like this call
updating with this information. When the
transaction ... was entered the cheque for £75 did not
appear in the stack, but then turned up on the cheques
listing. This information was not mentioned when he
initially spoke to Becky and would like it including in
the call."
Yes? So he still seems to be having difficulties
and he is trying to make sure that he is giving full and
precise details of what's going on, isn't he?
A. Yes.
Q. And then if we look down at 24 September 2001 -- this is
just slightly outside the main stream of the items
I have been asking to you look at -- we can see this is
a different SPM. You can see there it says:
"PM called as her system said that it was printing
a report for 20 minutes and she wasn't even printing
a report. She tried to settle a transaction to cash and
that came on screen. Advised PM to reboot and told her
I would update the call. PM happy."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So there are some things which appear to be actual
phantom transactions and then there are other things
which are phantom events that we might find in the
events log?
A. Yes.
Q. Like printing a report, when she is there; it is not
printing a report for 20 minutes at all, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then there's a repeat call about a monitor and then
if we look at the bottom of the page, 12 November, this
is basically the conclusion to all this:
"Phantom transactions have not been proven in
circumstances which preclude user error. In all cases
where these have occurred a user error related cause can
be attributed to the phenomenon."
And over the page {F/97/10}, "No fault in product".
It doesn't suggest, does it, a great willingness to
acknowledge what appear to be independently observed
faults with aspects of the Horizon system, does it?
A. Not from this, no.
Q. Now, if we go please to {F/773}. This is PEAK 0208335
and if we just quickly look in the summary it will give
us -- this is February 2011:
"Branches will be forced to declare stock when they
don't want to. Apparent reappearance of withdrawn stock
may cause spurious discrepancies."
Do you see in the summary box across the middle?
A. Yes.
Q. "Avoidance action taken so far is only appropriate in
the short-term while very few branches are affected;
over the next few months it could be affecting around
10 branches per week. NBSC aware of problem."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Just if we go over the page please to {F/773/2}, if you
look at the top -- just go halfway across the line at
the top:
"The office went into the declaration and confirmed
it showed the PO saving stamps and other stock items,
some showing as minus stock amounts, that were not
correct to the branch."
So the problem with negative stock appearing in --
this is in 2011:
"It somehow seems that the system has somehow picked
up this declaration and this is the cause of the
discrepancies appearing on the system. The SPMR was
told to declare the correct stock figures but is
reluctant to do this as this will cause discrepancies
when she next balances that are not relevant to herself
at the moment."
So that's a matter that would concern any
subpostmaster, isn't it, because they are effectively
having to declare something that they don't agree with?
A. Yes.
Q. And enter into the account on the Horizon system
effectively an account which accepts a discrepancy that
they completely disagree with?
A. From reading that, yes.
Q. Yes. So had you seen this PEAK before?
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Before today, or before your witness
statement?
A. No, I don't recall seeing this at all.
MR GREEN: So is it right that if you had heard that story
from a postmaster in any of the many conversations you
have had about difficulties they faced, you would have
assumed it was user error, wouldn't you?
A. Without -- yes, so without them ... with the situation
being referred to the Horizon service desk and Fujitsu
looking at it, without that happening then yes I would
have, if there was nothing to support ... but what
I would have done is looked at what's happened in branch
to determine whether there was a plausible explanation
in branch and if not if there's anything -- I mean this
is quite specific around -- I have seen this happen at
this time, I've got the reference -- the number of the
session ID, so this is quite specific.
Q. In a sense this subpostmaster was quite lucky that what
was being thrown up was stock that wasn't in use any
more because it's a lot easier for them to say "Well,
hold on a second, I don't even have that --"
A. Yes.
Q. -- "that item shouldn't even be there". So that's
really luck that that was the problem for this
subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. In that it was obvious, yes.
Q. Much easier for them?
A. Yes.
Q. But if what's thrown up is a stamps discrepancy for
first class stamps that they do stock, it's much harder
for the subpostmaster?
A. Yes, it would be.
Q. Yes. And what we see there is that whilst the previous
PEAK appears to be a hardware problem of phantom
transactions, this one appears more like a software
problem, does not it?
A. From this, yes, it does.
Q. And we can see at page 7 of this PEAK {F/773/7}, we can
see that this is closed on 10 September, final
"Administrative response" is the category for that PEAK.
It doesn't really give a hint of the trouble that's been
caused, does it, that category?
A. No.
Q. Mr Parker very fairly accepts in his witness statement
that the categories assigned were somewhat subjective.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. And were not ever actually audited to ensure
consistency.
A. Yes.
Q. I think that's a pretty shining example of that,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can we go now to {F/1286.2/2}. This is
a 9 December email and it is from the NBSC admin team to
the branch support team. Now, in 2014 you were head of
the branch support team, weren't you?
A. Yes.
Q. And what we see there is:
"Branch reporting that he has found sensitive issue
with Horizon when the system put a phantom cheque on the
cheque line in July 2013. Claims to have evidence to
support his claim."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. That would be pretty interesting to see, wouldn't it,
the evidence, if someone claims to have it?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. "Although he himself did not suffer a loss, thinks that
Horizon is flawed. Did not ask to be contacted about
this. Just wanted to say that he had this information
and threatened to go to MP as a result."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can we go back to page 1 please and just follow
this through {F/1286.2/1}. This is sent up by
Nigel Allen to Andrew Winn, Andy as he is known, yes?
And you know Andrew Winn, don't you?
A. Yes.
Q. And you have worked with him?
A. Not for very long; not directly.
Q. Okay. And what we see there is in the middle of the
page, Nigel Allen is saying:
"Given the current media and in particular the BBC's
attention on Horizon, do you think it is worthwhile
looking into this 'alleged flaw' with Horizon that this
SPMR has highlighted to preempt any enquiries from his
MP?"
And what comes back is:
"Hi Nigel,
"There is nothing I can investigate given the level
of detail provided unless he only accepted one cheque
in July 13. Even then I don't have the level of detail
needed and would need Fujitsu support. Without
a date/value we can't really raise a request.
"I don't really understand what the purpose of the
call is. Does he want it investigated or not? My
instinct is that we have enough on with people asking us
to look at things.
"I can't figure out how if a phantom cheque appeared
on Horizon he could avoid a loss unless another phantom
transaction took it away again!!!!"
Yes? So let's just unpack that, if we may. The
first point is that information which might be relevant
if you had an interest in knowing the truth about the
reliability of Horizon has been offered --
A. Yes.
Q. -- by a subpostmaster who has rung up, and the
subpostmaster has said they've got evidence, as we saw,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if one had any interest whatsoever in knowing the
truth about the reliability of Horizon, you would say
"Well, can you please get him to send the evidence",
wouldn't you?
A. Yes, you would.
Q. And that's not what happened?
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you consider that that reaction from
Mr Winn is an adequate reaction --
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- or an inadequate reaction?
A. That's a totally inadequate reaction. The fact that we
had the details from the branch on there -- you know,
the name of the branch, the FAD code, it would have been
very easy for Mr Winn to have contacted to get further
information and I would have expected him to have done
so.
MR GREEN: There is one final point on this email, if I may,
just quickly. The last bit of Mr Winn's email where it
says:
"I can't figure out how if a phantom cheque appeared
on Horizon he could avoid a loss unless another phantom
transaction took it away again!!!!"
And the point about that is that shows, red in tooth
and claw, that if a phantom cheque comes up into your
account you're going to suffer a loss, aren't you?
That's what he's saying?
A. That's what he is saying there, yes.
Q. And that's right, isn't it?
A. Well, it depends -- you know, it would come in as
a payment for something, so if he has had -- I'm not
sure actually and this is why it would have needed to
have been investigated because if a phantom cheque came
in then it would come in as a method of payment.
Q. Well, if a phantom cheque -- if you're supposed to have
received money that you haven't actually had, you are
not going to have the money in your branch, are you?
You're going to be short of something if on the system
you are supposed to have had a payment for something and
you haven't actually received it?
A. He is saying he has had a phantom cheque appear on
Horizon.
Q. Yes.
A. So to me that means he's got a cheque there that -- oh,
I see, he's got a cheque there that he hasn't actually
got.
Q. Yes. Horizon is showing a cheque he hasn't actually
had?
A. I think that is the classic example of why that needed
to be investigated.
Q. Yes, because -- let's put it very neutrally -- at the
very lowest, on the face of it there's a risk that he
may have had a loss --
A. Yes, absolutely.
Q. -- in that type of situation; is that fair?
A. Absolutely. And even though he has said he didn't have
a loss it could have meant that he made an error
somewhere else and he could have had a loss after all.
Q. Quite. Yes.
So this doesn't seem to have been drawn to your
attention at all, as far as we can see?
A. I don't remember this at all.
Q. No. Were you aware of that sort of problem being
discussed?
A. No. I mean if I had become aware of that I would have
requested an investigation to be done on that,
absolutely.
Q. Because people have had quite a lot of problems with
cheques over the years, haven't they? Subpostmasters,
one of the things that --
A. Yes, there have been errors with cheques.
Q. Yes. Let's have a look, if we may please, at the next
topic in your witness statement, transactions not
associated with SPM user IDs, which we see on page 6 of
your witness statement {E2/5/6}. If we go to
paragraph 18 {E2/5/6} and this is you responding to
Mr Henderson's suggestion that there may be transactions
associated with the user ID that the subpostmaster
didn't conduct.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Leaving aside for a moment the husband or wife who have
moved over while the other one has logged on and used
the log in or something like that, just leave that aside
for a minute, but one possibility is that an auditor has
accepted a TC on behalf of a subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. An auditor whilst in branch?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes, that is a possibility.
Q. Yes, because if we look at {F/499}, this note is
actually in Mr Abdulla's case:
"Call from auditor on 08.04.09 - postmaster not
present at audit so this TC was accepted and settled
centrally by auditor."
A. Okay.
Q. Is it your understanding that that's how things should
proceed in the absence of a subpostmaster at a branch?
A. Not normally. If a postmaster isn't available when
there's an audit then it is usually whoever they have
left in charge that we would ask to process anything
that would need to be processed on the day.
Q. Okay. Let's look at paragraph 18.4 {E2/5/6} where you
go on to deal with what you describe as a:
"... further very rare scenario in relation to
Legacy Horizon only, involving the insertion of
a transaction at the counter by the SSC."
A. Yes.
Q. "In this instance Horizon would associate the
transaction with the user ID of the individual logged on
at that counter. If nobody was logged on at the time
the transaction was inserted then the user ID would be
missing. These transactions would be clearly
identifiable in the audit trail as having been inserted
by SSC."
Now, taking it in stages, in the records where the
log in ID was shown, if the subpostmaster is logged on
at the time, the subpostmaster's own ID would show,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And you made this witness statement in November 2018.
This was something that you were aware of when you made
this witness statement, isn't it --
A. Yes.
Q. -- the possibility of inserting transactions?
A. The possibility but I've never actually seen this
happen. The possibility of it, yes.
Q. How long have you known about that possibility?
A. This is something I have not -- because I have not
experienced it myself, I have not known of it that long
actually.
Q. Could you give the court a rough idea of how long you
have known it was possible?
A. In terms of inserting transactions, last year or so.
Q. Who told you about it?
A. Anything to do technically with Horizon I would get the
information from Fujitsu.
Q. And was it Gareth Jenkins or was it someone else, can
you remember?
A. I have not got this directly from Gareth Jenkins.
Q. Do you know if it originally came from him?
A. It probably did.
Q. Probably from Gareth. When you say it would be visible
in the audit trail at the end of 18.4 {E2/5/7}, what are
you referring to as the audit trail?
A. So on the transaction log in branch.
Q. You say it would be visible on the transaction log --
A. In the branch.
Q. -- in the branch?
A. It would be visible to the branch that somebody other
than that user had done a transaction. That's my
understanding of how that works.
Q. Do you -- or do you in fact mean -- if you don't
actually know and you are having to sort of slightly do
your best for the court --
A. Yes.
Q. -- that's not a fair thing for you to be asked to do,
because you are on oath.
A. I've never see --
Q. Perfectly okay to say you're not sure.
A. I've never seen this so I can't speak on it from a
working knowledge of actually seeing it.
Q. And you don't actually know whether it would be on the
transaction log or actually in the audit store data in
the audit, do you?
A. So my understanding was it would be in branch that it
would be visible, but as I say I've never seen it so
I couldn't actually ...
Q. Okay.
My Lord, would that be a convenient moment for
a break?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, it would.
Mrs van den Bogerd, you will recall this from last
time but you are now in the middle of your evidence so
you are not to talk to anyone about the case. We are
going to have a short break for the shorthand writers.
We will come back in at 5 to.
(11.45 am)
(Short Break)
(11.55 am)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, can I just ask you to have
a quick look at page 45 of the transcript just before
the break.
We see at line 7 I said:
"Question: And you know Andrew Winn, don't you?
"Answer: Yes.
"Question: And you have worked with him?
"Answer: Not for very long; not directly."
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Just to clarify, could we look please at {F/1114}. This
is 7 August 2013.
A. Yes.
Q. This is the branch support programme terms of reference
and this was the programme that you were in charge of,
wasn't it?
A. That's correct.
Q. And at this stage Post Office had decided to try to
address the concerns raised by some postmasters over
recent years and at this stage Post Office commissioned
the independent review and so forth and we see the scope
there, first bullet point is:
"Post Office's attitude to subpostmasters which is
often defensive and unsympathetic, with a focus to
recover assets rather than to identify the root cause of
the problem."
A. Yes.
Q. This is what the interim report had identified,
isn't it, as we see in the introduction to those bullet
points?
A. Yes.
Q. And then the third one, for example:
"Lack of timely, accurate and complete information
provided to subpostmasters to support them in resolving
issues."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then the approach is then explained and if we could
go over the page please {F/1114/2} you will see there
the governance and key stakeholders are then set out and
Alice Perkins -- who was Alice Perkins?
A. She was the chairman at the time.
Q. She was the chairman. And Paula Vennells was the CEO
until very recently?
A. Yes.
Q. And they have requested the establishment of the
programme, which will be led by you?
A. That's right.
Q. With Gayle Peacock accountable for running it on an
operational level?
A. That's correct.
Q. Then if we look down to the underneath table in terms of
finance, on the programme board was Mr Ismay and then
working group level, Mr Winn, Alison Bolsover and
Paul Lebeter?
A. That's correct.
Q. That was the context, was it, in which you worked with
Mr Winn on these issues?
A. Yes. When we set up the mediation scheme as well,
a number of the queries -- when we were investigating
some of the issues then Andy Winn had been involved in
some of them previously and had worked with Second Sight
on some of the spot reviews as well, so I did -- that
was the first time I had come across Andy Winn, and
he -- FSD at the time was run by Rod Ismay and he was
part of that team.
Q. And his responsibility and the reason why he was
included in that group is in the right-hand column,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. The right-hand column is headed "Reason for inclusion
within the group".
A. Absolutely, yes.
Q. And if we look at the right-hand corner it says:
"Responsible for branch accounting and client
settlement. Also responsible for resolving specific
branch accounting issues."
A. Yes.
Q. So in terms of that, that was sort of front and centre
of what he was properly supposed to be dealing with,
isn't it?
A. The second part of that, yes, the issues. Not the
branch account and client settlement.
Q. Okay, so Mr Winn was responsible for the specific branch
accounting issues?
A. Yes, he did the dispute resolution, yes.
Q. So in context, he was the right person for that email we
looked at before the break to have gone to, wasn't he?
A. Yes, he was.
Q. That doesn't improve the unsatisfactory response,
does it?
A. Sorry, doesn't improve?
Q. Well, the fact that he is the very person who is
supposed to be dealing with it doesn't make it any
better, it makes it look worse?
A. No, it makes it worse actually, yes.
Q. Okay. Can we now look at lottery transactions, which
you deal with at paragraph 23 and following in your
statement at {E2/5/8}.
Now, you refer to the introduction of PING in 2012,
paragraph 25.
A. Yes.
Q. So you then explain how the system worked before the
introduction of PING and after the introduction of PING.
A. Yes.
Q. Before PING, 26.1 {E2/5/8}, SPMs had to activate
scratchcards on the lottery terminal and rem them in on
the Horizon terminal completely separately?
A. Yes.
Q. So if there was any difference between the two
activities that would create a problem or a discrepancy
of some sort?
A. Yes, it would.
Q. And at the end of 26.3 you say:
"There are many explanations as to why the two
figures do not match, the simplest of which is that the
branch had (i) activated a pack without remitting it
into Horizon or (ii) remitted a pack into Horizon
without activating it."
A. Yes.
Q. Now, if an SPM activated on a lottery terminal but
didn't rem it in on the Horizon terminal, if
reconciliation worked correctly there should ultimately
be a transaction correction sent to the Horizon
terminal, is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. And that in itself depends on the reconciliation process
working correctly, doesn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And that in turn depends on the integrity of the client
data being provided by Camelot?
A. Yes.
Q. And the process for determining whether a TC should be
issued within Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. And at 26.4 you say:
"By around 2010, the level of TCs from lottery
scratchcards had begun to grow. A practice had
developed in some branches whereby they would activate
the scratchcards but wait for the transaction correction
a few days/weeks later rather than actively remitting in
each pack on Horizon. They did this because it saved
them a little bit of time, but it caused their accounts
to become confused (because they would be selling
scratchcards without first having recorded the inbound
scratchcard stock)."
Now, pausing there, you are suggesting there that
that was a sort of conscious decision, yes? But it
could have been through a lack of understanding, or
a simple mistake, couldn't it?
A. Yes, it could have.
Q. And there were, as we have seen -- we saw in the common
issues trial there was a problem with very large lottery
TCs arriving weeks later.
A. Yes.
Q. Some of which were in error.
A. Yes.
Q. Some credits, some debits.
A. Yes.
Q. Both unsatisfactory?
A. Um ...
Q. When they are in error?
A. Oh, I see: yes.
Q. So that was why the policy we looked at during the
common issues trial was introduced, to try and cater for
that, not do them immediately before the end of
a trading period?
A. Yes.
Q. Amongst other things. And SPMs effectively became used
to quite a lot of lottery TCs coming in, didn't they?
A. From the numbers that we were processing, yes, I would
say that would be fair.
Q. And what about if a subpostmaster remmed in on the
Horizon terminal but didn't activate on the lottery
terminal, what would happen then? You would get a TC as
well?
A. Yes.
Q. And what changed when PING was introduced, which is
paragraph 26.7, is that lottery scratchcards were
actually activated on the lottery terminal and there was
no need to rem them in on the Horizon terminal any more?
A. It was an automatic, so the TA would come.
Q. So the information would go from the Horizon terminal
back to Camelot and be sent to Post Office?
A. No, it would go from the Camelot terminal.
Q. Sorry?
A. The Camelot terminal. It would go -- so the activated
pack would go to Camelot and then come into Post Office
and then it would come back to us.
Q. Exactly, yes.
A. Yes.
Q. So the SPM activates the pack on the lottery terminal?
A. Yes.
Q. That tells Camelot it has been activated?
A. Why he.
Q. Camelot tell Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. And Post Office send an automatic TA?
A. That's right.
Q. And that's generated automatically?
A. Yes.
Q. To avoid manual reconciliation difficulties?
A. Yes.
Q. And provided that the data coming back from Camelot is
correct and there are no problems in the data
transmission from the lottery terminal, that should be
correct?
A. Yes.
Q. And overall it was an improvement for SPMs?
A. Yes.
Q. And simplified the process?
A. Absolutely.
Q. And PING was not limited to scratchcards, it also
applied to lottery online sales as well?
A. Yes.
Q. It did take quite a long time to implement, didn't it?
A. I can't remember exactly how long from when it was first
suggested.
Q. Well, I mean lottery had been in branches since before
the introduction of Horizon?
A. Yes.
Q. So before 1999/2000.
A. I can't remember exactly when, but ...
Q. For example, Mr Bates, you might remember, was actually
required to have a lottery terminal in a prominent
position in his branch and then built it up and then
Post Office told him he couldn't have it any more?
A. What I'm saying is I can't remember when we actually
started Camelot business.
Q. I understand. Have a look if we may at {F/506}. And if
we look at page 3 {F/506/3} we can see on the version
control, the document history, at 2.2, the initial
version of this document is 2008, isn't it?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you looking at?
MR GREEN: 2.2, my Lord, "Document history", 0.1.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes.
MR GREEN: 10 October 2008. And if we look at page 9
{F/506/9}, we have the context of that document. The
background is:
"In line with the commercial contracts with clients,
a number of settlements made by product and branch
accounting are based upon data provided by the client.
Such an example is Camelot, where settlement is based
upon data captured by the Camelot terminal in outlets
rather than the data being captured at transactional
source by [Horizon]."
HNG-X, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it then explains:
"The client data is uploaded into POL FS,
[Post Office Limited Financial System] and compared with
the equivalent [Horizon] data which has to be manually
input ..."
That's into the old system:
"... by the agent/counter clerk. Ideally the data,
when compared, should be the same but a number of
conformance issues have been identified where
agents/counter clerks do not perform end of day routines
correctly ..."
And so forth:
"This difference may require the issuing of
a transaction correction."
That's what we have just covered. Then if you go
down to the paragraph that begins "Although", do you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. "Although client based settlements are not a preferred
settlement option it is recognised that the data being
provided by clients such as Camelot is robust,
controlled by reference data, and more accurate than the
[Horizon] data stream due to the conformance issues
mentioned previously."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So this was a big vote of confidence in the accuracy, or
in fact robustness as it is termed there, of the Camelot
client data stream?
A. Yes.
Q. "The solution is to automate a process that converts the
client data file (eg Camelot) into a data feed into the
branch ... the branch will then accept the data and thus
avoid the issues described above."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So the whole point of this is that it is robust data
from Camelot, with automatic TAs that are issued which
then come into the subpostmaster's account effectively
the next day, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And they automatically have to accept those?
A. Yes.
Q. And you then explain this isn't in fact implemented
until 2012, if we look at paragraph 25 of your witness
statement please {E2/5/8}. Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we look please at {F/1539}, on page 5 -- you probably
noticed on the first page it is authored by
Gareth Jenkins.
A. Yes, I saw that.
Q. And at 2.5 it says:
"It would appear that PING has gone live for Camelot
(at last)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And this was an internal recognition that it had taken
rather a long time, hadn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. This document is dated 9 August 2016.
A. (Nods).
Q. And it is clear -- if we look at {F/506/11}, just to
confirm I think what you have accepted, this is the PING
project interfacing client data into POL's systems
document. We can see that there is no provision there
at all for anything other than acceptance, yes?
A. Of the --
Q. Of the TA?
A. -- transaction, correct. Acceptance, right, okay, yes.
Q. The transaction acknowledgement as opposed to
transaction correction?
A. Yes.
Q. So if you look at number 3 it says:
"The branch will be presented with the value to
'accept' only ... no opportunity to write off or ask for
evidence due to the inherent robustness of the Camelot
data provided."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that was how it was intended to work and we will have
a closer look at that with some of the specific examples
with individuals at the minute, but that's the
background.
Let's look at Mr Latif's situation. If we look at
paragraph 98 of your witness statement please on page 24
{E2/5/24}. Now, in that paragraph the explanation you
have given there is essentially that there was a data
entry error by Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can you see that clearly in paragraph 98?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is prefaced with the words:
"To be clear, this was a data entry error by
Post Office and not an issue with Horizon."
A. Yes.
Q. Now, the point about that sentence is that sentence
tells the court that there's no problem with Horizon at
all, it's just someone manually entering the wrong
figure at Post Office, doesn't it? That's what that is
saying?
A. It says it is by Post Office, yes.
Q. So it's suggesting it is a manual error and not a system
problem?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. But we have just established from looking at the
documents, and you have agreed, that this process was
completely automated, wasn't it?
A. Automated, yes.
Q. So what you have said there cannot possibly be right,
can it?
A. No, from that, yes, it's --
Q. It's wrong?
A. The TA is automated. The TC is manually uploaded into
the system. Yes.
Q. Yes. So would it be fair to correct that part of your
statement --
A. It would be actually, yes.
Q. -- to say "To be clear, this is an issue with Horizon
and not a data entry error by Post Office"; is that
a fair correction to make?
A. I have made a mistake in that the way I have worded
that, absolutely, yes. So, yes, it is fair.
Q. Would you agree with the formulation I have given, or
would you prefer something slightly different? What
would you want the court to note as your evidence?
A. So the automated -- my understanding is the
transaction -- the TA is the information that comes from
Camelot to us and then it is passed through into
Horizon, so in that respect Horizon just conveys it, is
my understanding, and the information that's come from
Camelot in that respect would be incorrect.
Q. So the point is that either way, it is not a manual data
entry by Post Office?
A. No, it's not.
Q. Whatever it is, it's definitely not that, you agree with
that?
A. Yes, absolutely not. Agree, yes.
Q. What it could be is some problem with the information
somewhere between the terminal in the branch --
A. The lottery terminal, yes.
Q. The lottery terminal in the branch and the matters
showing up on the face of the Horizon terminal in the
branch?
A. Yes, I agree that.
Q. Somewhere there?
A. Yes.
Q. So it's definitely not a user error, is it?
A. No, that's not user error.
Q. Right. And on the face of it, it at least suggests some
doubt as to the robustness and integrity of the Camelot
data coming through in that automated system, doesn't
it?
A. I would say yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is it also the case that the branch
could have challenged the TA? Because I understood the
previous document to say they couldn't.
A. So they have to accept the T on the system, but if they
see something wrong on there they can actually get in
touch with FSC.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: On the helpline?
A. Or direct to FSC, because you can go to the helpline --
you can always go through the helpline NBSC into the
finance service centre anyway.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So looking at your final sentence of
paragraph 98 ...
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I understood the previous document to
say that the TA had to be accepted by the branch?
A. It does have to be accepted --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It does have to be?
A. On the system, yes.
MR GREEN: And that's just a straight acceptance, isn't it?
A. That's my understanding of that, yes. If I recall
correctly, on the screen that comes through it does say
to make sure it is right and if not then you would get
in touch with FSC. I don't know the exact wording but
that's my recollection, on the TA.
Q. You are aware that some people had problems with TAs
quite a few times?
A. Yes, from looking at the transaction corrections.
Q. Some people had duplicate TAs, some people had all sorts
of problems with the TAs coming through, yes?
A. I would also say it is fair that most branches would
just accept it anyway.
Q. They would just accept it anyway some of them?
A. Because they -- you know, on the understanding that it
is an automatic pull-through from what they have
activated, I would -- my working assumption is most
people just hit the button and accept it.
Q. Well, you have to accept it, don't you?
A. Yes, but what I'm saying is they would do it --
Q. And you wouldn't do anything more --
A. -- yes, without even really looking at it.
Q. I mean in fact we can see that in -- slightly ahead,
I was going to take you to some of the documents that
show that that was actually internally anticipated by
Post Office, that what was anticipated was there would
be a basket and people would generally just hit "enter"
to accept all?
A. Yes.
Q. That's what was anticipated, wasn't it, and I think you
very fairly volunteered that just now?
A. Yes.
Q. Let's just have a little look at the helpline log please
at {F/1223/1}. It is 12 June 2014. I think that is
a native file so we just need to download that and it
will come up in a second. If we look on I think the
"Individual incidents" tab and then if we go to row
431 -- if we perhaps just type 431 in the top left-hand
box.
At row 431 you can see there National Lottery in
column H, transaction corrections is column I. If you
scroll to the right slightly please, "Lottery TA issue",
"PM says has still got a discrepancy due to the TA
problem."
Yes?
A. Yes, I see that.
Q. If we go down to row 2375 and you see "TC for
National Lottery", you can see in column L:
"TC not received for the TA that was duplicated from
last Saturday for National Lottery. Printed off TC
report and on there as processed."
So there's an issue there and if we just look at
3176:
"Lottery TAs: PM still not received TC for the TA
problem."
These are helpline call logs for the week of -- we
just looked at entries for 9 June, 10 June and 11 June.
These are the sort of problems that you fairly accepted
people had from time to time?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at the document at -- well, I might be
able to take it more quickly. There were also problems
that people were receiving TCs when they didn't know
what it was for in relation to National Lottery. That
was internally acknowledged, we saw it in the common
issues trial?
A. Yes, the lack of explanation on the TC.
Q. Yes. And then people were raising queries about errors
relating to the downloaded duplicate TA files in June.
A. Yes.
Q. 2014. Do you remember that?
So there was a problem with duplicate TAs, wasn't
there, from time to time?
A. From time to time, yes.
Q. Let's look please at {F/965/22}. TAs were later
introduced for Post and Go and Paystation transactions,
weren't they?
A. Yes.
Q. And if you look on page 22 there you will see:
"Crowns have incurred discrepancies as a result of
missing TAs ..."
Do you see the second box down, "Post and Go TA
missing or duplicated"?
A. Yes.
Q. This is under "Current issues". This is an integral
fraud and conformance report.
A. Okay.
Q. So that's Crown offices, that's not SPMs, is it?
A. No, that's directly ...
Q. Yes, so they were experiencing them too?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look back -- let's look at {F/1228} please and
what we're going to here is a branch user forum record
of input from users of Horizon and once we have loaded
it we're going to look at line 74. If we can go down to
line 74 and you can see there -- go slightly to the
right so we can get the whole ...
"Lottery and Paystation: why can't I sell lottery on
Horizon as other retailers do and similarly why is not
the Paystation functionality contained on Horizon -
saves messing around with separate tills or pots of cash
with TAs the following day or even later."
And so forth. And he makes the point about the
costs being borne by the subpostmasters at the bottom.
Just pausing there, the lottery terminal and
Paystation were not within the original design of the
Horizon system, were they?
A. No, they weren't.
Q. Even though lottery, for example, was in use prior to
the introduction of Horizon?
A. Yes, but it has always been Camelot's.
Q. So they were added on and that introduced the pre-PING
issue of mistakes between the terminals?
A. Yes.
Q. And then questions about whether it is user error or
something else that's gone wrong, there's an opacity
there, and post PING it introduced the issue of
duplicate TAs and difficulties with the integrity of the
data stream all the way through?
A. Yes.
Can I just say, when -- so when we brought in
Horizon very early on, the format of a post office was
very much that the post office was behind a counter,
screened counter, and the lottery terminal was always
designed to be on the retail counter and the Paystation
was -- it was more of an out of hours, so it was never
built as one, it was literally a very different part of
the post office itself and the retail, so it was very
different.
Q. It's a fair observation, but equally I think you would
accept it is a fair observation to remind oneself that
one of the conditions of appointment that Mr Bates had
to agree to, from Post Office, was that he would operate
a Horizon terminal from which Post Office would
profit -- not in his shop for him to profit from it, but
on behalf of Post Office --
A. Yes.
Q. -- he would operate a Horizon terminal in his branch.
It was actually a contractual requirement for him, yes?
A. Run through Post Office, yes.
Q. So that --
A. I'm just explaining why it wasn't part of the -- you
couldn't add it on to Horizon, it was very -- physically
very different, that was what I was saying. That was my
point I was making.
Q. He was required to have it in a prominent position at
his counter, wasn't he?
A. In some post offices it was. All I was explaining was
that in the vast majority it was physically apart from,
distanced from the main counter, which was behind
a screen. That was the only opponent I was making.
Q. I understand. Let's have a look at what you say about
failed reversals please. This is paragraph 154 of your
witness statement {E2/5/34}. Now, here you have moved
on to respond to go what Mr Coyne says. Do you see
that? It is on page 34.
A. Yes.
Q. E2/5/34, paragraph 154. It is under the heading just
above 153 "Mr Coyne's report", just to orientate you
where you are in your witness statement.
A. Yes.
Q. And you say:
"I address below a number of factual points raised
by Mr Coyne in his report."
Just pausing here. Mrs van den Bogerd, you
obviously took a lot of care over this witness
statement, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. That's fair?
A. Yes.
Q. And probably had even greater focus perhaps and greater
time to devote to this than someone dealing with an SPM
ringing up might have?
A. Sorry, what do you mean?
Q. You had more chance to look into all these things you
have dealt with, a greater opportunity to research and
look into these things, to provide this witness
statement?
A. In some areas, yes, I have, yes. Not in all because of
the way things were changing.
Q. But where you have been able to comment on a document
you have been able to consider it carefully and so
forth?
A. I have tried to, yes.
Q. And let's look at what you say about failed reversals.
You say:
"At paragraph 5.175 of his report, Mr Coyne has
referred to a report prepared by Helen Rose dated
12 June 2013 in the context of failed reversals. The
extracts taken from the report by Helen Rose referred to
by Mr Coyne are taken out of context and mistakenly
claim that the relevant reversal was issued in error by
Horizon not the subpostmaster. The Rose report makes it
clear that:
"The concerns were based on the fact that reversal
were not being shown on the particular data sets
reviewed/reports typically run by subpostmasters in
branch on Horizon;
"Transaction reversal data can be extracted from
Horizon ... the issue was therefore surrounding how the
transaction reversals were displayed/accessible in
branch and that there was no issue with Horizon itself."
Now, just pausing there, that is not something that
you have changed, is it?
A. No.
Q. Let's have a look please if we may at the underlying
document, the Helen Rose report itself, which is
{F/1082}. It is dated 12 June 2013. Can you see that?
A. Mm-hm, I can.
Q. Is this the document you looked at?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, if we look at page 2 of that document please
{F/1082/2}, it is obviously headed "Confidential and
legally privileged" and it is "Horizon data - Lepton",
the subpost office, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Executive summary:
"A transaction took place at Lepton
[subpost office] ... for a British Telecom bill payment
for £76.09; this was paid for by a Lloyds TSB cash
withdrawal for £80 and change a given for £3.91. At
10.37 on the same day the British Telecom bill payment
was reversed out to cash settlement."
Looks pretty suspicious, doesn't it, so far? Yes?
A. The running order of the times, do you mean?
Q. Does what we just read there look a bit suspicious?
A. Sorry, is this --
Q. Does it make it look as if it something strange has
happened?
A. Oh, right, yes.
Q. The bill payment has been reversed out for cash?
A. Yes.
Q. "The branch was issued with a transaction correction for
£76.09 which they duly settled ..."
So all that means is that they press "settle"
centrally, doesn't it? They can't dispute it -- we have
covered this lots of times. They can't dispute it on
Horizon, so all the postmaster can do is ring up and
deny --
A. I'm not sure that he actually settled in this one,
I think he made it good. I can't remember actually. In
terms of the way she is referring to language.
Q. Let's have a look.
A. Because it doesn't say settle centrally.
Q. Okay, maybe settled it in cash.
A. Yes, that's my understanding.
Q. One way or the other, what we then see is:
"The postmaster denied reversing this transaction
and involved a forensic accountant as he believed his
reputation was in doubt."
So he is having to instruct a forensic accountant to
help him over £76.09, is what we've got so far in the
story, isn't it?
A. As telling in the first review, yes.
Q. Let's look at reviewing the Credence data. Now, just
pausing there, we know, don't we, from Tracy Mather's
witness statement that the Credence data records the
actual key strokes that have been used?
A. Yes.
Q. So that's a really important source if you are in doubt
about what's actually been done by the postmaster, if
they say "I had help from the helpline and I did
a complicated set of key strokes", look at the Credence
data, that will tell you, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And so Helen Rose very sensibly looked at the Credence
data and said:
"... it clearly indicates that the reversal was
completed by JAR001 (postmaster) ..."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. At 10.37.
"... and was reversal indicator 1 (existing
refersal) and settled to cash. An existing reversal is
where the session number/automated payment number has to
be entered to reverse the item."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The Fujitsu logs were requested for this branch, but
whilst waiting for these to arrive communications took
place with Gareth Jenkins at Fujitsu for more details to
gain an understanding of what had occurred at this
branch."
And then we get questions and extracts in various
emails in response. It doesn't come up very clearly,
but black is the question and blue is the answer.
A. I can see that on here, yes.
Q. "Question - I am requesting Fujitsu logs for Lepton ...
to look at a reversal that the postmaster denies
transacting, do I need to request further details and
also could you explain what happens when the system
fails. (Gareth looked at data at his end prior to me
receiving the Fujitsu logs ...)
"Answer - this shows that session 537803 was
successfully saved to the [branch database] ..."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "... but when the user JAR001 ..."
Which we know is the subpostmaster:
"... logged on again recovery reversed the session
in session 537805."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So what the Credence data showed was it had been an
actual reversal by the subpostmaster, but in fact when
Mr Jenkins got into it he found it was actually a system
recovery that had reversed the session, didn't he?
A. Yes.
Q. And so he then goes on to say:
"It isn't clear what failed, but if it was a coms
error, then the system would have printed a disconnected
session receipt and the clerk should have given the
customer £80 and told him his bill was unpaid. The fact
that there is no indication of such a receipt in the
events table suggests the counter may have been rebooted
and so perhaps may have crashed in which case the clerk
may not have been told exactly what to do."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The reversal was due to recovery (Counter Mode Id =
118) so this was not an explicit reversal by the clerk.
This scenario is fairly rare so it is certainly quite
easy for the clerk to have made a mistake and either he
or the customer could be in pocket/out-of-pocket
(depending on exactly what happened!)."
Then this:
"The system is behaving as it should."
So there were issues, weren't there, where a problem
could arise for a subpostmaster by design of the system;
were you aware of that? There was a whole category of
PEAK codes for faults which are agreed between Fujitsu
and Post Office to just stay like that as part of the
design?
A. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You actually put two questions there.
MR GREEN: I'm sorry.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: On the second one you went on to codes,
so you really need to split them.
MR GREEN: That's entirely my fault. I'm sorry,
Mrs van den Bogerd.
Let's take it in stages. You can see there it says
"The system is behaving as it should"?
A. Yes.
Q. That would be problematic for a subpostmaster,
wouldn't it?
A. The way Gareth describes it here would be, yes, because
what he says is that it would have printed the session
receipt but it doesn't seem as if it did, when actually
disconnection transaction receipts were actually printed
in this example and a recovery receipt was printed. But
that's not referred to in here.
Q. Well, let's just have a look at that. Let me just ask
you my second question and then we will go on to probe
that with more care. The second point is are you aware
of a closure code for Fujitsu for PEAKs which refers to
faults which are known in the Horizon system but agreed
between Post Office and Fujitsu to stay there?
A. I'm not aware of a closure code.
Q. You didn't know about that?
A. No, I don't know about that.
Q. Okay.
Let's look at the question at the bottom of
{F/1082/2} which we are on. This is Helen Rose:
"I can clearly see the recovery reversal on the
Fujitsu logs received, but would this have been clear
had we not previously discussed this issue?"
That's her question. And the answer comes
{F/1082/3}:
"Note that the standard ARG spreadsheet may not make
it easy to confirm that the reversal was part of
recovery, but the underlying logs used to extract them
can show it."
A. Yes.
Q. So what Gareth Jenkins is pointing out to Helen Rose is
that the standard ARQ data would certainly not make it
clear but the underlying logs used to extract the ARQ
data can show it, has the capability of showing it, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then he then talks about the Excel spreadsheets of
what appear to be the underlying data and he says they
are part of the standard ARQ returned and it says:
"Rows 141 ..."
In the second line of that paragraph:
"Rows 141 to 143 of 4 to 25 October ... clearly show
a reversal. Also row 70 of [the events data] shows that
session 537803 ... has been recovered and this event has
the same time stamp as the reversal session. Also
row 71 ... shows that a receipt was generated from the
session ... (not explicitly, but it was the only session
at that time). This receipt would have told the user
that a roll back had taken place (but the logs don't
make that explicit). If that is sufficient for [your]
purposes then you do have all you need in the standard
ARQ."
Then he says:
"However what I was able to confirm from my look at
live data a couple of weeks ago and is also held in the
underlying raw logs is confirmation that the reversal
was generated by the system (and not manually by the
user). What might also be available in the underlying
logs is whether or not the system was rebooted -
I suspect it was but have no evidence one way or the
other (and it isn't in what was extracted this time
either). I can confirm that the user did log on
again ..."
And so forth. Now, just pausing there, you would
agree, wouldn't you, that if we go back to paragraph 154
of your witness statement at page 34 {E2/5/34}, let's
look at what you say there, top of page 35 if we may
{E2/5/35}:
"... mistakenly claim that the relevant reversal was
issued in error by Horizon, not the subpostmaster."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Well, we can see from what Gareth Jenkins has actually
said in the actual document you are looking at, that
that's wrong, can't we, the reversal was not done by the
subpostmaster, it was done by the system?
A. It was done by the system absolutely, yes.
Q. It was done by the system and not by the subpostmaster?
A. Yes, it was done by the system, yes.
Q. So it's fair to say that what we have at paragraph 154
is wrong, isn't it?
A. "... the relevant reversal was issued in error by
Horizon ..."
It wasn't issued in error, it was actually issued by
Horizon. So I am obviously not be making myself clear,
but yes, there's no question that that was done as part
of that recovery and it was system generated.
Q. Well, look, Mrs van den Bogerd, be fair, what you have
written there looks to a natural reading as suggesting
that Mr Coyne has mistakenly claimed that the relevant
reversal was issued in error by Horizon, not the
subpostmaster. The contrast is who has issued the
relevant reversal.
A. I understand. That wasn't what I was saying. There's
no question that it was issued by the system, it was
definitely generated by the system and if that's -- and
I have obviously not explained myself very clearly.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So what was the mistake then that you
refer to at the top of page 35?
A. That the reversal was an error, because the reversal
itself wasn't an error and the receipts were printed.
So in fact it was part of the recovery, the system did
go down and the BT bill actually was reversed at part of
that. So I have just misread and misexplained that
then, because I was -- there was no doubt in my mind
what had happened there -- because this was part of the
spot review by Second Sight, so I was familiar with the
detail at the time and from Helen's report what she is
saying is that it is not obvious that that reversal has
been done by the system because it is against the
Horizon user's ID and clearly it would be better if it
was obvious and I fully agree with that.
Q. But to be fair, Mrs van den Bogerd, the point that this
Helen Rose report makes is almost exactly the opposite
point to the one you were making in your statement. The
point that this report makes is that it might appear to
have been done, on the initial logs -- yes? If you just
read the beginning it shows -- look at page 2, let's go
back to page 2, {F/1082/2}. Do you see the first
answer:
"This shows that session 537803 was successfully
saved ... but when the user JAR001 logged on again
recovery reversed the session ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So it was the system that reversed the session not the
subpostmaster, wasn't it?
A. Yes, it was.
Q. And that's the opposite to what you are saying at the
top of page {E2/5/35}?
A. Okay, but that's not what I meant, because I clearly
have always known that that was a Horizon system
generated recovery and the reversal was part of that
recovery.
Q. But you were suggesting there that Mr Coyne, the expert,
had mistakenly claimed something. You weren't just
casually saying it in your witness statement, you were
pointing out that Mr Coyne had got it wrong and
positively suggesting the reversal had been done by the
subpostmaster, weren't you?
A. That wasn't my intention and I'm sorry -- clearly I have
not explained myself very well there at all, because
I was in no doubt at all that that had been generated by
the system.
Q. Well, let's go back, if we may, to F/1082 and look at
page 3 please {F/1082/3}. Halfway down there is
a question:
"I can see where this transaction is and now
understand the reason behind it. My main concern is
that we use the basic ARQ logs for evidence in court and
if we don't know what extra reports to ask for then in
some circumstances we would not be giving a true
picture."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's effectively what happened at the top of your
witness statement -- on that page in your witness
statement, isn't it? You were not giving a true picture
because you had got the wrong end of the stick?
A. Re-reading that, yes, that's correct.
Q. And then Helen Rose says:
"I know you are aware of all the Horizon integrity
issues ..."
Can you tell his Lordship what those were?
A. At this point it would have been the fact that
Second Sight were working with us investigating some of
the cases. That's all I can think that Helen means at
that point.
Q. Did you have any particular ones in mind at that point?
A. It would have been this one particularly, because as
I said this was one of the spot reviews, which is one of
the early ones that Second Sight investigated before we
actually went into the mediation scheme.
Q. Okay. And it says:
"... and I want to ensure that the ARQ logs are used
and understood fully by our operational team who have to
work with this data both in interviews and in court."
And she says:
"Just one question from my part - if the reversal is
system created but shows as an existing reversal, could
this not be reflected with a different code ie SR
(system reversed) to clear up any initial challenges.
My feelings at the moment are not questioning what
Horizon does as I fully believe that it is working as it
should, it is just that I don't think that some of the
system based correction and adjustment transactions are
clear to us on either Credence or ARQ logs."
That's what she is saying, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And that was a fair observation, wasn't it, by her?
A. That was a fair observation, yes.
Q. About the shortcomings of Credence and ARQ logs, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And Gareth Jenkins' answer:
"I understand your concerns. It would be relatively
simple to add an extra column into the existing ARQ
report spreadsheet, that would make it clear whether the
reversal basket was generated by recovery or not.
I think this would address your concern. I'm not sure
what the formal process is for changing the report
layout. Penny, can you advise as to the process: is
this done through a CR?"
Do you know what a CR is?
A. Change request.
Q. Change request, okay. Then at the bottom:
"I do believe that the system has behaved as it
should and I do not see this scenario occurring
regularly and creating large losses. However, my
concerns are that we cannot clearly see what has
happened on the data available to us and this in itself
may be misinterpreted when giving evidence and using the
same data for prosecutions.
"My recommendation is that a change request is
submitted so that all system created reversals are
clearly identifiable on both Fujitsu and Credence."
Do you know if that change request was acted on
after that?
A. I don't believe it has been acted on.
Q. You don't believe it has been?
A. I don't believe so.
Q. Can we move please now --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I have just got a question on this
document which I'm going to ask now rather than at the
end. Could we go back one page please to page 2
{F/1082/2}. You will see at the bottom of that page
there are three paragraphs in blue and then a paragraph
in black. In the bottom paragraph in blue it says:
"This scenario is fairly rare so it is certainly
quite easy for the clerk to have made a mistake and
either he or the customer could be in
pocket/out-of-pocket (depending on exactly what
happened!). The system is behaving as it should."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Am I right that the alternatives are --
"he" meaning the subpostmaster.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So the subpostmaster being in pocket,
that's one of the alternatives, is that right?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The subpostmaster being out-of-pocket.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is that the other alternative?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And the other side of those two coins is
either the customer being out-of-pocket or the customer
being in pocket.
A. That's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are those the options?
A. Yes, those are the options.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do I appear to have missed any out?
A. No. That would have been -- on the disconnected session
receipt it would have said on there whether to -- on the
recovery whether the payment should have been made to
the customer or not and that's what the person in branch
would use to guide them with that printed receipt. But
you haven't missed any options, that's --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I haven't missed -- I have covered the
basics?
A. Yes, you have.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And those are examples of the system
behaving as it should?
A. Yes. With the disconnected session and then the
recovery receipt it would be, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Over to you, Mr Green.
Just to clarify one point, you look at -- if we
look -- let's do it from here while we are on there. We
are on this page. Can you see the paragraph three up
from the bottom:
"It isn't clear what failed ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "... but if it was a coms error, then the system would
have printed a disconnected session receipt ..."
A. Yes.
Q. And then the next sentence:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table ..."
That suggests that the receipt you are talking about
isn't recorded in the events table, doesn't it?
A. It does and that's the bit I don't understand on this,
because the receipts were printed.
Q. But look at 155 of your witness statement {E2/5/35}.
You say:
"There is therefore no indication that the reversal
was not notified to the subpostmaster."
A. Yes.
Q. But that's exactly the point that's being made,
isn't it?
A. No, no. The point is that he had the receipts.
Q. Well, I will give you one last -- I'm not going to press
it too long, but let's go back to {F/1082/2}. I just
afford you the opportunity to reconsider that answer.
You are on oath. Have a look please --
A. Sorry, sorry. So from this what he is saying is that
the receipts would have been printed.
Q. Well, just look at the third paragraph up from the
bottom. If it is because you have misunderstood what it
says let's clarify it now. Third paragraph up from the
bottom, I have just shown you the third line of that:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table suggests the counter may
have been rebooted and so perhaps may have crashed in
which case the clerk may not have been told exactly what
to do."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I do see that.
Q. Right. Now, just to be fair to you let's go back to
your statement please, page 35 {E2/5/35}. Let's take
the context very carefully and let's look at 154.3
please:
"The issue was therefore surrounding how the
transaction reversals were displayed/accessible in
branch ..."
Yes?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Now, that is correct in part, isn't it, because there
was an issue about what the subpostmaster could see in
the branch, yes?
A. Okay, yes.
Q. Right, and you then say there is no issue with Horizon
itself. Let's just park that. Look at 155. You then
say:
"There is therefore no indication that the reversal
was not notified to the subpostmaster. When recovery
was carried out a discontinued session receipt would
have been printed and messages would have been clearly
displayed to the user in branch during the recovery
process."
Now, go back please, having that in mind, to what
I have just shown you, {F/1082/2}. Third paragraph up
from the bottom, three lines down:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table suggests the counter may
have been rebooted and so perhaps may have crashed in
which case the clerk may not have been told exactly what
to do."
So it's fair to say, isn't it, that there is an
indication that the reversal may not have been notified
to the subpostmaster?
A. So from reading that then absolutely. All I'm saying is
I know that those receipts were printed because I have
seen them on an email between Second Sight and the
postmaster, so I know they were actually printed.
That's my only -- that's what I'm saying. From reading
what you said, absolutely agree, but all I'm saying here
is -- and clearly Helen Rose and Gareth at this point
didn't know that those receipts were actually printed.
Q. So you are actually giving evidence that contradicts the
document that you have referred to?
A. So all I'm saying is I know -- I know that these
receipts were printed in this scenario.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you mean in this particular instance?
A. Yes. So the Armstrong -- Mr Armstrong is the
postmaster, Lepton is the branch. This was -- it was
a spot review undertaken by Second Sight early on before
we went into the mediation scheme. Now, when they did
the initial investigation with the postmaster he didn't
know he had the receipts, so it was written in that way
and then when Second Sight went back to him before and
said -- and he actually found the receipts.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Understood.
A. Sorry if I have misled, I didn't intend to, but it's
just that I know those receipts were printed and it's --
MR GREEN: I'm glad we took it carefully to work out
precisely what you are saying.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But as far as this document is
concerned, if I understand what you have just said is
your knowledge is wider than shown on this document
alone --
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- because of the other documents you
have mentioned.
A. That's what I'm saying, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is that a useful place to stop and you
perhaps --
MR GREEN: I've got --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, put your question, but it
sounded to me as if there was some documentary
assistance stage right which you just might want to look
at.
MR GREEN: I can understand.
But, Mrs van den Bogerd, just two separate points in
relation to this. It may be that the subpostmaster was
notified that a reversal had taken place, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. From a receipt which they don't refer to?
A. Disconnected session and the recovery receipts.
Q. But there's nothing in that documentation or what would
have been displayed at the branch to have shown the
subpostmaster how that was being recorded as who had
done it, whether it was the subpostmaster or the system,
is that fair?
A. I'm trying to recall the receipts. I think that's fair.
Q. Thank you.
A. Yes, it -- the receipt would have shown it happened, but
not --
Q. At whose behest?
A. I believe that's correct but I would need to check the
receipt, but I do believe that's correct.
Q. And we have now seen it was a system recovery not
a subpostmaster recovery?
A. It was always a system recovery.
Q. I'm grateful.
My Lord, is that a convenient moment?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes. We will actually come back at 5
past 2 just in case you need to pursue some documents.
Same form as before, break until 5 past 2, please
don't talk to anyone about the case and we will resume
then.
(1.00 pm)
(The luncheon adjournment)
(2.05 pm)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, could you look please at
{E2/5/35}, paragraph 156 of your witness statement. You
will see there you deal with changes to improve Horizon
in branch and you make a reference to the fact Mr Coyne
has picked up on the phrase "relatively small changes to
Horizon could avoid errors/mistakes made in branch", do
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Could we look please at {F/1258} and this is a document
with a 1 October 2014 Opus date but "September 19"
written on the front. It is, as far as you remember,
a 2014 document, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And look at page 2 please {F/1258/2}:
"There are five staff related wave 1 initiatives
within finance with a cumulative run rate impact of 51
FTE and £4.8 million ..."
That's 51 full-time employees, isn't it?
A. That's correct.
Q. Let's just look at the initiatives. "Near-term process
improvements", and then "Demand reduction - make small
change in Horizon to reduce errors in branch", 3 "Demand
reduction - reduce housekeeping and other losses,
4~"Demand reduction - negotiate Santander contract to
remove manual transcription". That fourth one is
a reference to not manually transcribing data provided
by Santander, isn't it?
A. Yes, moving away from paper based.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Could you keep your voice up.
A. Sorry.
MR GREEN: And if we look at number 2, which is the one I'm
inviting you to focus on, this is making a small change
in Horizon to reduce errors in branch, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go a few pages forward to page 18 please
{F/1258/18}, do you see there under the "Executive
summary":
"A significant proportion of demand at FSC is driven
by errors/mistakes made in branch with entering in data
into Horizon. Part of these errors can be avoided with
relatively small changes to Horizon (eg related to two
part transaction for bureau pre-order, mismatches with
AEI third party kit ..."
AEI is auto exchange information, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. That's automatic exchange of information with third
parties?
A. Yes.
Q. "... top up and redemption ..."
And just look at the end of that box:
" ... the 'quantity' field for cheques and miskeys
in general ..."
Then:
"Ease of implementation: medium. There exists an
interdependency on IT for changes in Horizon to reduce
errors coming from upstream."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And so there is an interdependency with upstream data
errors because if you have got problems in the data for
example coming in from Camelot, that's not something
that the miskeying problem is going to deal with on its
own, but it is right, isn't it, that pretty much since
Horizon was introduced it had been noted that miskeying
did represent a source of errors in the branch --
I think you even said that in your witness statement for
the first trial?
A. That's correct.
Q. And we can see that the changes that were being
contemplated in October 2014 are said to be relatively
small changes, yes?
A. Yes. From this, yes.
Q. And could we look please at {F/476/1}. Now, this is
a "Summary of IS review". What does IS stand for?
A. I would assume information security.
Q. And who was Peter Laycock?
A. I don't know. I've never come across him before.
Q. The document itself says it is dated 2008. The first
item he deals with there, number one,
"Deliberate/accidental miskeying (clerk)", that's
a reference to a subpostmistress or subpostmaster,
isn't it?
A. Yes, somebody in branch, yes.
Q. Or their assistant?
A. Or their assistant, yes, but it could also include
a Crown branch as well.
Q. It could be a Crown branch. And the recommendation is:
"Double entry and cross-validation of freeform
transaction values at the counter for all financial
products ..."
So that would be one a way of dealing with it,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. An alternative might be simply to say any transaction
which is over £500 you just have to click "confirm" or
"enter" twice?
A. On the --
Q. That's another way of doing it?
A. On the Horizon system you mean, do you?
Q. Yes, on the Horizon system?
A. Yes.
Q. That would avoid some quite large losses potentially,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the operational impact:
"May add some time to process at counter (minimal)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "System impact":
"Change to Horizon required to prompt for double
entry and cross-validation should not be overly
complicated or expensive ..."
And then "Opportunity" --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: What does "PL" mean in brackets? If you
don't know, don't worry.
A. I don't know exactly what that means in this context.
MR GREEN: I think, my Lord, we have read it as possibly
referring to comment by Peter Laycock himself, but we're
not sure.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Fine.
A. Yes.
MR GREEN: Then "Opportunity":
"c.80% reduction in disputes and claims - saving
800k per annum in compensation, agent debt and business
write-off for bill payments ..."
Etc and then:
"Staff reduction potentially at P&BA."
And if we go over the page, "Other business
benefits":
"Major improvement of point of transaction data
integrity."
That would be a good thing, wouldn't it, to improve
point of transaction data integrity?
A. Yes.
Q. "Double entry, customer sight and validation ... will
minimise balancing issues ..."
That's a good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. Deter fraudulent behaviour, that's a good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. And help to target investigations where there's lower
volume of those sort of problems?
A. Yes.
Q. And then "Operational efficiency", you see fourth bullet
point:
"Less balancing errors, productivity savings, less
calls to NBSC and partner banks."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. "Increased confidence to the customer, partners,
clients, agents ..."
Et cetera. Yes? All pretty sensible and good
ideas?
A. Yes.
Q. And then we say -- we just note at the bottom there:
"Please Note – financial savings may have increased
since 2008."
So that tends to suggest the document had been
updated. Is this a document you had ever seen before or
not?
A. No.
Q. But you were aware of miskeying as an ongoing issue?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at {F/994/4} please. In fairness to you,
Mrs van den Bogerd, sorry, could we look at page 1
{F/994/1} so Mrs van den Bogerd can see what it is.
This is the miskeyed project feasibility study in 2012,
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go please to page 4 {F/994/4}, you will see
under the background section at 3.1:
"As part of the P&BA centre of excellence drive, one
of the areas of concern is the number of instances of
mis-keyed transactions that occur and much to the
detriment of P&BA. A mis-keyed transaction occurs when
an incorrect value is input by the counter clerk, which
causes a poor customer experience. The mistake can have
a significant impact on the branch and resource is
required in P&BA to manage the client and address the
error. A very large value mis-keyed transaction will
put the viability of a branch in doubt."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And we've got some statistics about how much it is
costing a year in terms of total of investigations and
so forth.
So on any view, that had potentially a pretty
serious impact for a branch, didn't it, and that was
internally recognised in that document?
A. Miskeying, yes.
Q. And on page 10 {F/994/10}, there's a risk and issues
section at 5.5:
"If nothing is done to prevent miskeying within
Horizon the current bill of £10 million will spiral out
of control."
"Recommend resolve.
"Make it happen to improve the situation where
miskeying occurs."
Then:
"Many of the workforce is not aware of the miskey
situation. It is part of this project to get the
message across to the network ..."
Et cetera. And if we then go forward -- I'm not
going to take you to them, but just looking at sample
helpline logs, if I can deal with it generally -- I'm
happy to show you them if you want but they are those
Excel ones which take a while to download.
A. Yes.
Q. But in the NBSC call logs, in the helpline call logs in
the week of 13 April 2014, which we've got in the bundle
at {F/1201}, we've got, for example, 10,789 rather than
1,089.37; in the 16 August 2015 {F/1368} we've got
19,400, should have been 1,940, that's row 1171. We've
got row 1578, 14,000 instead of 1,400.
At {F/1429}, 7 February 2016, we've got 3,400 keyed
in as 34,000 and 4,428.58 entered as 44,298.58.
Pausing there, I'm not going to show you but those
are the sorts of numbers you recognise --
A. Yes.
Q. -- as the sorts of miskeying problems that people were
encountering, is that fair?
A. Yes, that's fair.
Q. In your first witness statement you identified miskeys
as a cause of shortfalls, which I think you fairly
accepted earlier?
A. Yes.
Q. And can we look please now at {F/1449}.
Now, this document is from 31 March 2016 and
the heading is "Overkeyed online banking cash deposit
customer present - end of procedure" and then it says:
"Is the amount of the miskey greater than £150?" and
there is "No" on the left and this is what to advise
branch, it looks like the helpline:
"Advice the branch that if the discrepancy is still
apparent when balancing they must make the amount
good ..."
And then:
"If deemed necessary a transaction correction will
be sent at a later date to counteract against the
initial discrepancy."
Then "Yes":
"Advise branch that if the discrepancy is still
apparent when balancing they must make the amount good
(loss or gain)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So in some of the examples we have seen, if it is a very
substantial sum, ie greater than £150, the right-hand
branch of that would see a branch being advised that if
the discrepancy is still apparent when they are
balancing they must make it good.
A. Yes.
Q. And that could be a very large number and that's why we
saw the previous -- the document we saw from 2014 was
saying that a large discrepancy could put the viability
of a branch in issue?
A. Yes.
Q. And the suggestion -- if you come down the middle of the
flowchart, the first box in the middle says:
"Open word document ie 'miskey A&L' or miskey
non-A&L."
That's miskey Alliance & Leicester or non-Alliance &
Leicester, isn't it?
A. Yes, that's right.
Q. Because I think Alliance & Leicester inherited the
Girobank?
A. Yes.
Q. "Complete the appropriate sections of the form by using
the information included within the incident log."
And:
"To find the miskey form follow the file path
P:\Core K Base\Miskey Forms\Miskey A&L or Miskey Non
A&L."
And then "Save a copy of the completed form to 'my
documents' and paste a copy into the incident log."
And so forth.
So that fairly reflects what's actually happened
with miskeys since the documents we have been looking
at, does it?
A. That looks like what you have read out off the NBSC.
Q. Let's now move to your examples of changes that have
been introduced, which are found at paragraph 156 and
following {E2/5/35}. These are other other changes. If
we look, for example, at the three you have chosen to
identify in paragraph 158 -- so just for some context,
you have obviously been in charge of branch support and
latterly improvement?
A. Yes.
Q. So you are the person to go to for this evidence,
aren't you?
A. For some of it, yes.
Q. And you have chosen these as -- are these good examples
of the sorts of improvement that have been made?
A. They are some examples, yes. These are the ones that
were affecting the customers and postmasters in
particular.
Q. Okay. Well, let's take them in turn, if we may. Let's
start please with Drop & Go, that's at 158.1 and 158.2
in your witness statement {E2/5/35}, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. So you point out in 158.1 that:
"In November 2014 as a result of some branches
settling Drop & Go sessions to cash instead of the
customers pre-paid account, a screen prompt was added to
the Horizon journey advising branches to not press
settle at the end of the session before they had pressed
end mails."
Then two and a half years later:
"... this was taken further as a new Drop & Go
transaction was introduced which prevented users
pressing the settle button before end mails ... the
screen prompt was removed at the same time as it was now
redundant."
A. Why he.
Q. That sounds all quite a happy experience, doesn't it, on
the face of your evidence there? It sounds as if it all
went quite well?
A. It took a while and there were quite a few problems with
Drop & Go actually. It did take a while. So there was
a first fix but a recognition at the time that it needed
to have a complete review of the transaction.
Q. Yes. That extra bit doesn't leap off the page, does it?
A. No, it doesn't.
Q. The problems and the difficulties?
A. But it was -- yes, it has been which is why it was two
stages in here, the first and then the second, but
I take your point.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at {F/1346}. So
here we're looking at 2 June 2015 and this is the ATOS
presentation and if we go over the page to page 2 please
{F/1346/2} it is referring to the online mails project,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "... to introduce a new online channel for customers
looking to send parcels via the Post Office by use of
a service called Click & Drop. The project was also
scoped with the task of aligning this new service to the
existing Drop & Go service and offering an online
channel for those SME customers. As the project
progressed, Click & Drop was descoped
during September 14 and the Drop & Go changes were
deployed on 5 November 14."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. That's the deployment of the changes you are referring
to in your witness statement, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And then it says:
"The enhanced Drop & Go service introduced a new D&G
database hosted on CDP ..."
Do you know what CDP is?
A. Core digital platform.
Q. The core digital platform:
"... and aligned the Horizon Drop & Go basket
behaviour with the standard Horizon basket
functionality."
If we just go down to the bottom of that paragraph:
"This reinstated the existing known issue of locking
customer accounts if the correct counter processes are
not followed."
You see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "Since go live a number of issues have been encountered
that have resulted in a large number of blocked customer
accounts, a resultant high volume of calls into NBSC and
dissatisfaction within branches and for impacted
customers."
If we look over the page please on {F/1346/3}, you
can see the fifth bullet point there is:
"Lessons learned that have been a captured to ensure
that other similar projects don't suffer from the same
pitfalls."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go over the page {F/1346/4-5} we can see what
was effectively happening. There is a timeline there.
And if we can just go please to the "Lessons learned" at
page 12 {F/1346/12}, "Commercial decisions over customer
experience" is the heading, "Summary":
"The decision was taken to allow a known design flaw
to continue to enable customers to use their D&G
accounts to purchase other mails products."
And then under "Limited and non-effective
communications":
"Limited training and communications were issued to
branches as this was assumed to be an incremental change
to an existing product."
And the recommendation there is:
"Branch staff should be engaged during user
acceptance testing to provide a user's view on the scale
of the change to inform the type of training and
communications approaches that should be applied."
These are the sort of things that you were referring
to in your answer that added to the text of your witness
statement, the sort of difficulties that were
encountered?
A. Yes. I wasn't aware of the exact details of what, but
I knew there were problems.
Q. Okay.
A. I can't remember the date but at some point Drop & Go
came to the branch user forum for feedback.
Q. Yes. If you want to see that I can show you where that
is. That's at {F/1194}. There's a branch user forum on
20 March. Is this the one you are thinking of,
halfway --
A. No, I wasn't at this one. So the product manager for
Drop & Go, I invited her to come and take the input from
the branch user forum whilst they were looking at the
design of the improvements going forward, so she came
a couple of times, but I wasn't at this particular one
and I usually chaired this.
Q. Will you forgive me if we just sort of press on.
A. Yes, certainly, yes.
Q. What I was going to say is you will understand why
I suggested to you that the difficulties with Drop & Go
hadn't leapt off the page?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is fair to say that it gives -- what you had
actually written included, gave a slightly rosy picture,
is that fair?
A. Without going into all that detail, yes, that's fair.
Q. And if we look please now at {F/1549}, so we're now
looking at the June 2017 changes and what was
anticipated for those changes on 7 October 2016, let's
just have a look at that please. You will see that's
the front of the document and if we look please at
page 3 {F/1549/3}. You will see there "Summary",
"Issues and options", and the box at the top says "Money
out of thin air upon timeout (introduced by prototype".
Were you aware of this difficulty that was encountered
at the time?
A. I've never heard of that terminology before.
Q. You haven't?
A. Not creates money out of thin air, I've never heard of
that.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I'm really sorry, I'm having great
difficulty hearing what you are saying.
A. Sorry. What I said is I've never heard of that
terminology: creates money out of thin air.
MR GREEN: Had you heard of the problem by another name?
A. No, not that I can recall. As I say, I knew there were
problems, but not to that detail.
Q. And what type of document is this, if we just go back to
the front? {F/1549}. Is this an operational document,
does it look like, or ...?
A. No, there would normally be another facing sheet to
a presentation, but if it was to existing prototype it
typically would be part of the project, the project --
Q. Right, an IT document?
A. Yes.
Q. I'm just asking because if we look at page 3 again
{F/1549/3}, there is a redacted column on the right.
A. Yes. It's not something I have seen before so ...
Q. Okay. If we go to page 5 please {F/1549/5}, just to
sort of take this in stages, can you see on page 5 we've
got the same heading at the top: A money out of thin air
upon time out", do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then number one in the table is "Do nothing", 2 is
"Post settle script to detect", 3 is "Monitor available
balance outside of basket", 4 is "Operate Horizon in
Drop & Go mode disabling Fast Cash and allowing settle
only against D&G account."
A. Yes.
Q. And the various risks and so forth are identified there.
Then look at number 1:
"Excess cash in till, compared to Horizon,
incentivises fraud. Remedy by FSC involves a debit
'transaction correction'."
Have you ever heard of a discussion of a debit
transaction correction being used in quotes in that way?
Is there anything ...?
A. No. That doesn't make any sense to me.
Q. Okay. Let's see -- if we go over the page to 6
{F/1549/6}, number 3 says:
"A new mode like 'back office' mode. This mode
would remove 'Fast Cash' and constrain 'settle' to just
the D&G account; also to be used by time out."
Are these things you understand or is this not
something you can really speak to, this document?
A. No, this is something I wasn't involved in, so it's not
something I can actually talk to.
Q. Just have a look if you would very kindly -- I will go
more speedily on this then. Page 10 please {F/1549/10}.
There is a diagram of what would happen and I should say
this appears to be the prototype that's being proposed:
"Start mails looks up - but does not debit - the
customer's account balance."
And then on the right:
"And credits that amount to the basket, effectively
creating cash out of thin air."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I see that.
Q. So what we can see from this is that even reasonably
well thought through proposed changes to Horizon could
at least potentially have unintended effects. We can
see that, can't we?
A. Sorry, in the prototype you mean?
Q. Yes.
A. Okay.
Q. I mean it is obvious that this prototype has been
developed as a proposed prototype which is being
discussed fairly carefully and we can see from that that
tweaking one aspect of one function might trigger
something in another aspect of Horizon?
A. Yes.
Q. That's what we can see?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go please to page 13 {F/1549/13}, this is
"Proposed detection and correction" with Chesterfield
effectively investigating and then at (e):
"A matching credit to a 'write-off' account so that
the cash that appeared out of nowhere returns to
nowhere."
That seems to be sort of getting the imaginary cash
to vanish out again out of the account?
A. Yes.
Q. On the face of it, doesn't it?
A. It does.
Q. Then just look over the page, last point on this,
page 14 {F/1549} if you would:
"1. The reason for the transaction correction
is ..."
This is the critique:
"The reason for the transaction correction is opaque
to the branch ..."
For a reason that perhaps we can't see. That would
obviously be undesirable, wouldn't it, to have --
A. Yes.
Q. And then 3:
"The initial credit to the basket offends against
the conventions of double entry bookkeeping."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Because you are getting a figure pop up without
a corresponding figure. And then:
"Routine use of write-offs is inappropriate and
unacceptable to Ashley Hall's team."
So that's the critique. Having seen that, there
were clearly not only some problems with Drop & Go that
you were aware of and its development, but also some
others, is that fair?
A. That would be fair.
Q. If we just look very quickly at {F/1640}. That's
an email chain and if we can look at page 3 where it
begins {F/1640/3}, if you look at the bottom message,
you will see:
"Hi,
"This is to get feedback from model office and for
POL to confirm the release to the 54 pilot branches with
the pilot to commence on Friday 28.04."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then "Minor fix is required" in the next message up
on the right-hand side, "Currently in progress for the
pilot"?
A. Yes.
Q. And then 27 April at 11.26:
"From discussions with Jeff Smyth due to the
negative impacts of 15.92 on other projects the POL
recommendation is that the Reference data for Pilot is
NOT to be released on Friday."
And then at the top:
"After having had a conversation between yourselves
on the below impact ... it now transpires that the code
cannot be released ... as per the agreement yesterday.
"Can you please have a discussion and let me know
what has been decided and as a result the retrospective
action be taken in the next 30 minutes. Note the code
has gone into MO and we are planning to move ahead to
pilot tomorrow unless someone lets me know in the next
30 minutes."
And if we go to page 2 {F/1640/2} at the bottom we
see:
"My understanding is that the live code that is
deployed in the MO has broken the existing live code for
telecoms that is already live in the rest of the network
estate. If we were to deploy it (beyond MO) we will
create a P1/P2 issue in the live network estate which is
a crazy thing to do."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then if you just look at the penultimate paragraph:
"I've already checked with Rob H and Mick M on this
one - we cannot consciously put code live if we know it
will break the bigger network, especially on the run-up
to a bank holiday."
A. Yes.
Q. Did you ever hear about the fact that there was a risk
of a break to the bigger network in the run-up to a bank
holiday, sort of 30 minutes away?
A. No.
Q. Did that -- no?
A. No. I mean the whole point of testing the model is
obviously to see what the impact of it would be and
obviously that's what they said will be the impact if it
were to go live.
Q. So it's fair to say, isn't it, that there's quite a lot
that goes on in the background that maybe doesn't get
quite up to your level, would that be fair?
A. This would be routine. To go into the model office for
testing, it would be routine, yes.
Q. But it was going beyond the model office to the pilots,
that's the point. That's what they're about to do,
isn't it?
A. But once it got the go ahead from the model office --
Q. Yes.
A. And I haven't read all of it, but just reading what you
have taken me to, what I read from this is that it found
that it would break something else.
Q. So they stopped it just in time?
A. That's what I would anticipate from this, yes.
Q. Okay. Let's look at cheque rem out, the cheque rem out
problem, that's paragraph 158.3 of your witness
statement at page 36 {E2/5/36}. Now, errors in relation
to the remming out of cheques go back pretty much to the
beginning of Horizon. They have been an issue over
time, haven't they?
A. They had been an issue, yes.
Q. And you have pointed here to an improvement that's made.
A. Yes.
Q. And you say there:
"This was a change to bring all the steps in the
cheque rem out process onto a single screen and automate
the calculation of the cheques total for the counter.
This was prompted because branch staff occasionally
forgot to complete the process fully due to
interruptions, allowing extra cheque transactions to
occur mid-process from other counter positions."
Now if we look please at F/1129 and have a look at
page 4 of that document please {F/1129/4}. This is the
Horizon improvements workshop and 1.5 is "Rem out for
end of day cheque processing", "Summary":
"Customer cheques accepted during the trading are
processed at end of day. The clerk performs the
following process ..."
You see remming them out and then over the page
{F/1129/5} we have got:
"This is a lengthy process and unnecessarily runs
the report twice. It also increases the potential for
the clerk to enter an amount which does not match the
report total amount."
And then just below the diagram:
"Having reconciled the results against the physical
cheques they then navigate to back office, rems and
transfers, out to cheques, cheques and enter the total
amount to rem out and settle ... they then have to
navigate again to back office, reports, cheques and
preview or print the report. Finally they have to cut
off the report.
"Suggested improvements.
"An improvement could be to provide an additional
button on the counter daily cheques listing screen to
invoke the cheque rem out process and return when
complete."
So it is quite a good idea, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that fairly indicates what the problem was and what
the proposed solution was going to be. If we look at --
so that's 5 September 2013. If we go to {F/1225}
please, 25 June 2014 and you will see if we go to
page --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This has got August 2013 in the middle
and September 2013 in August writing at the bottom. It
doesn't seem to have June 2014. I'm not saying it
isn't June 2014, I just can't see June 2014.
MR GREEN: My Lord, in fact if I can just deal with the
version control. If we go -- we've got the wrong
document up there.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you want 1125 or 1225?
MR GREEN: We want 1225.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's probably the explanation.
MR GREEN: I probably called it out wrong.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: No, no -- it doesn't matter. Is that
the one?
MR GREEN: That's the one, 25 June 2014. And this is branch
support programme. So this is June 2014; you were
involved in the branch support programme at this time?
A. Yes.
Q. And we can see at the bottom KPIs, key performance
indicators.
A. Yes.
Q. "The programme will track performance against the
following key performance indicators ..."
And then your name is alongside Gayle Peacock's at
the bottom there.
A. Yes.
Q. If we go over the page please we see there is "Programme
progress" and if we go forward a page to item 4.4 on
page 3 {F/1225/3}:
"Horizon system transaction improvements ... the end
of day cheque remittance process has been reviewed and
a new solution to drive out errors has been identified.
This will be scheduled for the next software release
in October 2014 will reduce the calls into NBSC and the
transaction corrections issued by [the FSC]."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that was what the intention was, was October 2014.
Then if we go forward please to {F/1323}, this document
is -- at the very bottom of it says 9 March 2015, do you
see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go to page 4 please {F/1323/4} we can see that
the first draft of the document was actually
3 February 2015, yes?
A. Yes -- sorry, yes.
Q. And if we go forward one further page {F/1323/5},
"Associated documents", we have the change proposal for
cheque rem out just there at item 7 in the top box, do
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So it hadn't actually come in in 2014 October, had it?
A. No.
Q. And in fact your witness statement confirms it was
brought in in August 2015?
A. Yes.
Q. And when it did come in it made things a lot easier for
subpostmasters?
A. Yes.
Q. Was there any reason why that couldn't simply have been
done within a couple of years when the problem had been
noticed?
A. So when I picked it up in the branch support
programme --
Q. I'm not criticising you, I'm just saying is there any
reason why that change could not have been made in say
2002?
A. Well, it depends what else was going on at the time, but
I mean on the face of it --
Q. There isn't any real reason, is there?
A. On the face of it that was quite a straightforward ...
Q. Yes.
A. And it did take -- it took me longer to get it
introduced than I would have liked anyway. It didn't
cost an awful lot of money to get it sorted either, so
ideally I would have liked it --
Q. Ideally it would have been better to do it a long time
ago?
A. Yes.
Q. If we can move forward now please to bureau de change at
paragraph 158.4 in your witness statement which is back
on page {E2/5/36}. Do you see there:
"Bureau de change automated 2nd receipt. This was
a change to Horizon in September 2014 to introduce
a function defining the number of copies of a receipt
for a transaction which will automatically be printed.
This was prompted because some branches were being
defrauded by the use of fraudulent debit cards for
bureau transactions. If the counter clerk did not print
a second receipt for the branch to keep (showing
4 digits from the card number ... (a fraudulent
transaction would not be refunded by the card issuer."
A. Yes.
Q. So from a practical point of view what was going to be
proposed was that there would be assistance to try and
help avoid the problem of a second receipt not being
printed?
A. Yes.
Q. Shall we just look at how that actually happened. If we
look at {F/1129} and you can see this is back in the
Horizon improvements workshop in 2013.
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go to page 5 of that document please
{F/1129/5}. That is effectively -- if we just look at
"Travel money debit card branch receipt" at the bottom,
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. 2.1:
"When a clerk sells travel money to a customer, and
the customer pays by a debit card, the security check
responses performed by the transaction and card details
are printed on the session receipt at settlement.
"The clerk can request a duplicate session receipt,
but if they do not and proceed with another customer,
then the reprint is no longer available to the clerk."
So a moment's inattention and they are at risk of
underwriting any fraud which otherwise the bank would
bear?
A. Yes.
Q. And that has always been like that?
A. Yes.
Q. For years?
A. Yes.
Q. And it says there -- it explains:
"If the bank subsequently challenges the
transaction, the postmaster needs to provide proof that
the security checks were performed. They cannot do this
without a receipt and may therefore have to make good
the transaction and be out-of-pocket."
Then the suggested improvement is to print
a duplicate branch receipt when the travel money is paid
for by debit card:
"In order to be consistent with other receipts this
should probably indicate it is a branch copy."
That's pretty straightforward, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And it avoids that risk of a moment's inattention taking
literally one key press beyond where they can get back
to get what they need, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look please at {F/436} you can see there this
is an old document, this is a 2008 document, and we can
see on page 57 of that, if we may, {F/436/57} that the
system automatically prints the customer receipt for the
transaction, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. At the bottom. Then if we go over the page {F/436/58},
this is the point about subpostmasters being told:
"You must print a duplicate ...(Reading to the
words)... information is mandatory ..."
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you reading from?
MR GREEN: Just at the top, my Lord "Please note".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes.
MR GREEN: So press the "feed" key on the printer, so you
have to remember to print the "feed" key on the printer
and then request a duplicate receipt as a branch copy,
that's what they have to remember to do.
A. That's right.
Q. So that was the old system. The short point is that was
actually quite a simple thing to change again,
wasn't it?
A. Yes it was.
Q. It was a good idea which was fairly simple to execute
which you brought in?
A. Yes.
Q. And there wasn't really any big reason why that couldn't
have been done ages ago?
A. My view was -- when I learned of the problems that
people were having with it, is that -- if a receipt is
required as part of the transaction my view was it
should have always been automatically produced.
Q. Yes.
Now can we move forward to one of your responses to
what Mr Coyne has said in relation to MoneyGram please.
If we look at paragraph 161 of your witness statement
{E2/5/36}, you say:
"Turning to the MoneyGram example referenced by
Jason Coyne, in October 2015 MoneyGram and Post Office
agreed jointly to introduce debit/credit card acceptance
for payment ... this change was aimed at making
MoneyGram at Post Office more attractive for
customers ..."
And then at 162:
"Accepting debit/credit cards as a method of payment
is familiar to branch staff, however, processing
a refund for MoneyGram card payments is different so the
instruction given to branches is to liaise with NBSC to
ensure the branch is walked through the correct
process."
A. Yes.
Q. "This was an added step check to prevent the branch
making an error."
So one way of reading that is to suggest that when
this was brought in branches were told to liaise with
NBSC. That's what it naturally reads, is that right?
A. Yes. It did have instructions of what to do, but the
fallback was ring NBSC, because it didn't happen very
often anyway.
Q. Okay, well, let's just look at that in a tiny bit more
detail, if we may. Let's look please at {F/1382}. This
is a 1 October 2015 document, "New and improved
MoneyGram service", and it says in the highlighted
passage:
"The Horizon transaction screens have been designed
to help you transact these services simply and
compliantly. Please refer to Horizon Help for
operational instructions and further information."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then over the page {F/1382/2} on the back it says:
"Important note - the refund/cancellation process
for MoneyGram has changed.
"If a customer wants to cancel their transaction and
obtain a refund on the same day, you must ... go through
the MoneyGram refund button to cancel the transaction.
You then need to use the back office reversals process
to reverse out the transaction (this is the case for
both debit card and cash transactions)."
A. Yes.
Q. So that's if it is on the same day. And then:
"All refunds/cancellations the following day or
later ... are refunded to cash through the MoneyGram
refund button (regardless of method of payment), the
back office reversals process doesn't need to be used."
So what this is saying is if it is on the same day
you have to use the back office reversals process as
well as the refund button?
A. Yes.
Q. And otherwise you don't, yes?
A. Yes. It says cancel and then reverse, yes.
Q. Does it mean the same calendar day?
A. Yes. When you say -- well, it means on the day of its
being -- yes.
Q. The day, so if it's Tuesday, it means on Tuesday?
A. On the same day, yes.
Q. What about if it is after polling time? Do you know
what polling time is?
A. From -- so the instruction -- my understanding was it
was if it was on the same day and if it was after -- and
if it was the next day you would need to treat it
differently. That was my understanding.
Q. Yes. But taking it in stages, it just says "the day"
there, doesn't it?
A. Yes, it does, it just says the day.
Q. And it doesn't say you must speak to the NBSC, does it,
when you do a reversal?
A. Not on this one, no, it doesn't.
Q. No. So that's the October 2015 one and then if we look
please at paragraph 163 of your witness statement
{E2/5/37} where you refer to further communications to
remind branches, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And you are referring there to the first one is
3 March 2016 Branch Focus article. Can we look at
{F/1440} please. Now, we haven't got this in the
context of the Branch Focus magazine, we can't see where
it sits amongst some of the other content, but it could
be quite varied, couldn't it, in the Branch Focus?
There could be lots of --
A. I see, yes, there could be quite a number of pages in
there.
Q. We had "summer sizzlers" and other things last time.
A. Yes.
Q. But we've got the text that is said to be what was said
and we can see here, "MoneyGram refunds". If you come
down to just below "To manage customer expectations",
can you see:
"To process a MoneyGram refund to a debit card
please contact NBSC ... before completing the
transaction."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that's on 3 March 2016 and you can see there that
this one now does say contact the NBSC, where
the October 2015 one didn't say that?
A. Yes, that's right.
Q. And Mr Patny had his problem with MoneyGram on
23 February, about ten days before this new guidance
came out, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So for the purposes of Mr Patny could we fairly rewrite
what you say at paragraph 162 on page 36 of your witness
statement, {E2/5/36}, would it be fair to say that the
instruction given to branches from 3 March 2016 was to
liaise with NBSC?
A. If that's the date of that one, yes.
Q. Yes. Then the next thing you refer to at 163.2
{E2/5/37} is the flowchart at {F/1767}. Can we have
a look at that please. So we are now in
19 February 2018. Again, we don't know exactly where or
how this was in the Branch Focus article?
A. My understanding is it was attached to that version of
it. That's my understanding, it went out with that
version of ...
Q. Well, this one seems to be 19 February 2018 this one.
Is that right? You said it is 19 February 2018 in your
witness statement?
A. Yes, because the actual diagram itself isn't dated, the
flowchart itself isn't dated on here.
Q. Yes.
A. So when I located it it was with that Branch Focus is
how it was presented to me as that's when it went out,
on that date.
Q. On which date, 19 February?
A. Whatever I have said, date -- yes.
Q. I'm just pointing out we haven't got the actual Branch
Focus --
A. No.
Q. -- we have just got the flowchart that you say went out
with it and it says "MoneyGram decision tree - refund
customer diagram V0.2". Did this definitely go out?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And can you come down from "Customer wants
a refund", if you come down to "Cancellation approved?",
if you go straight down the "Yes" arrow, "Same day
refund?" and the arrow then says "Before 7 pm cut off?"
A. Yes, I see that now, yes.
Q. Now, that is the polling time at which the branch's
business day ends, isn't it, and the branch's business
day transactions are then sent off?
A. Yes, I mean transactions continue after, but yes.
Q. They do, but that's the polling time at the end of the
business day for the branch?
A. Yes.
Q. You will probably remember sitting in court when
Mr Patny was saying he was on the phone to the helpline
to try and do his reversal at just after 7 o'clock?
A. Yes, I remember him saying that.
Q. He said a couple of times that was past polling time.
A. Yes, I remember him saying polling time, yes.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at {F/1664}. Now,
this is an operations board agenda for July 2017. A lot
of it is blank, but if we could go please -- well, now
blank. If we go please to page 86 {F/1664/86}, it was
at least at this stage finally recognised I think
that -- if we go down:
"The main root causes for the increase in items
were:
"Branches retrying transactions that had failed due
to timing out."
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you reading?
MR GREEN: Under "The main root causes", the second bold
heading, my Lord.
Do you see that, Mrs van den Bogerd?
A. Yes.
Q. "The main root causes for the increase in items were:
"Branches retrying transactions that had failed due
to timing out."
Because that had become a bit of a problem,
hadn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Timeouts in relation to MoneyGram transactions.
"Branches reversing a transaction but not cancelling
the AP part of the transaction."
A. Yes.
Q. Is that the authorisation process?
A. Yes.
Q. "General lack of understanding in branch of how the
process works, especially for refunds."
And then:
"MoneyGram and POL systems were out of sync re
cut-off times. Poll cut off at 19.00 and MoneyGram at
24.00."
Then in bold:
"Towards the end of 2016 changes were made to the
transaction journey and the cut-off time.
"MoneyGram changed their cut off time ..."
Et cetera and also:
"The end to end transaction journey time was
extended from approximately 8 seconds to 30 seconds."
That was in order to try and stop the timing out
happening?
A. Timing out, yes.
Q. And then there are some next steps listed:
"More work being done to establish the root cause of
error (branch conformance/product complexity)."
So it is right, isn't it, that in fact the issue of
MoneyGram was a little bit more complicated, because
initially it didn't say "Contact the NBSC"?
A. Yes it changed, yes.
Q. And then that then changed. And then there was
a flowchart which for the first time mentioned the 7 pm
rather than the calendar day, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And distinguished between pre-7 pm and post and then
eventually at the end of 2016, as reflected in the 2017
document, the polling days for Post Office and MoneyGram
were then aligned?
A. Yes. The flowchart was the best, I think, communication
out to the network around the stages to go through.
Q. Okay. Let's just look, if we may, at {F/1556} please
and if you could look very kindly -- you see that's
a 21 October 2016 document. Have you seen that before?
A. I don't recall. I don't recall seeing this actual
document, but I was party to some of the operations
duplication work.
Q. Let's look please at page 4 {F/1556/4}.
A. Sorry, what date did you say this document was?
Q. This document seems to be 21 October 2016. Does that
make sense?
A. Okay, yes.
Q. If we have a look at page 16 of it {F/1556/16} we've got
the document history and you will see the version
history at the bottom and it says initial draft,
30 September 2016, Andy Greening. Who is he?
A. He is one of the change analysts.
Q. One of the change analysts. Do you know him?
A. Yes.
Q. And you have worked with him?
A. Yes.
Q. Review by Dawn Brooks. Who is she?
A. Dawn used to be a change analyst, one of the managers,
in FSC.
Q. And is Andrea Horner doing the same job as well?
A. Andrea Horner was a project manager with us, she was
a contractor with us for a short time.
Q. Okay. So it seems to be anyway a document, the date of
which is in October 2016, and if we just look please at
page 4 {F/1556/4} there is a management summary:
"Post Office branch 'back office' balancing and
accounting processes are still rooted in legacy
practices and methods. These operations processes and
associated workflows are inefficient and susceptible to
losses and fraudulent activity. Many business rules are
ill-defined and the language is confusing to those who
operate the processes."
Now, some of those who are operating processes are
in FSC dealing with supposed shortfalls from
Post Office's point of view, yes?
A. They would be, yes.
Q. People deciding on transaction corrections?
A. Yes.
Q. And also of course one shouldn't forget the
subpostmistresses and subpostmasters who have got the
other end of these processes in a sense?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is the reconciliation of the back office data and
the front office entered data that causes a discrepancy,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at "Drivers for change", 1.2, it says:
"There is a requirement for balancing and
reconciliation processes to be intuitive and easy to
operate and for those processes to use simple language
and applied business rules that negate the requirement
for excessive training in branches and back office
support services."
So what really you are saying there is this should
be absolutely intuitive on the Horizon system and in the
processes that relate to it?
A. Yes.
Q. So that you don't have to go and explain super
complicated things to people in branch and then have
mistakes which then have to be sorted out. Is that
fair?
A. Absolutely.
Q. And that's obviously a good idea?
A. Of course.
Q. And there's a requirement for integration of data into
Post Office Limited's front office systems, which is
basically the Horizon facing system for the SPMs?
A. Yes.
Q. And that would obviously be a good idea as well, in that
if the front office data and the back office data was
visible in the front office, they would be able to see
both?
A. Yes.
Q. These are all good ideas and it's not surprising that
you think they are good ideas because you are the person
who signs off on this document at the end on page 17
{F/1556/17}.
A. Yes.
Q. Did it begin to seem familiar when we were going through
it?
A. So -- yes, absolutely. So ATM, so ... I don't
absolutely recall this particular document if I'm
honest, but --
Q. You remember the broad points, trying to streamline the
back-end office processes?
A. Absolutely. So at this time -- and I can't be sure of
the dates, but I was the director of support services,
so FSC was under my remit at the time and what
I particularly wanted to do was try to get things right
at the front end to stop driving -- obviously right for
the front end in the first place but then to stop
driving, as you have described, the workarounds and the
activity to put right things that should have been right
in the first place.
Q. I understand.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, you have to keep an eye on the
clock for the shorthand writers.
MR GREEN: My Lord, would that be a convenient moment?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I imagine you have more than five
minutes.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I have. I'm not going to finish with
Mrs van den Bogerd today but I will be finished well
before lunch tomorrow and we are timetabling everyone
else to fit in --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This is day one of your four days.
MR GREEN: Indeed.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mrs van den Bogerd, you heard that
exchange so apparently you are still going to be in the
witness box tomorrow but we will have a break now for
the shorthand writers so we will come back at 20 past 3.
Same as before, don't talk to anyone about the case.
(3.14 pm)
(Short Break)
(3.22 pm)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, just following through
a couple of further documents in relation to MoneyGram.
Can you please look very kindly at {F/1502} please. You
will see that's a MoneyGram quarterly business review,
18 July 2016.
A. Yes.
Q. And if you could look please at page 24 {F/1502/24}.
"Problem statement":
"Multiple instances of system latency have been
reported since 24 January 2016."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The latency was exposed by changes to the IT
environment in the January release."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So it has come to the fore after the January release of
the software, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it identifies the purpose and benefits and then
fourth bullet point at the bottom of that page:
"This latency is causing some transactions on the
POL system to time out, resulting in high traffic to the
operational contact centres and obvious customer
impact."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go over the page please {F/1502/25} we can
actually see the "Instances of latency since February"
diagram shows weeks commencing 22February onwards, can
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And 22 February 2016 is the highest one by quite
a margin, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And 23 February is when Mr Patny has his difficulties,
isn't it, with MoneyGram?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go forward please to {F/1502/29}, do you remember
Mr Patny thought that he had got a duplicate
transaction?
A. Yes.
Q. 3,100 and then he seemed to have 6,200 --
A. Yes.
Q. -- was what he thought had happened. Look at the bottom
of that page, "Reconciliation":
"Duplicate transactions are created in [MoneyGram]
systems as a result of Post Office time outs.
"A joint MG/POL team is working to ascertain impact
on settlement and implementation of an appropriate plan
of action."
A. Yes.
Q. It wasn't wildly well advertised to subpostmasters that
this problem was being dealt with at the time?
A. No. People were aware there was an issue, clearly, in
branch and then --
Q. People in the branch had an issue, but they were
probably being blamed for user error, weren't they?
A. Well, they knew there was an issue and they were ringing
into NBSC at the time.
Q. Sorry?
A. They knew there was an issue and they were ringing into
NBSC at the time.
Q. Well they were claiming there was an issue but they
might be met with "This is user error"? They didn't go
"Oh, by the way, have a look at the graph which shows
there has been a spike in the very week I'm complaining
about" because they didn't have that information,
did they?
A. Not unless there was a message on the helpline system.
I'm not aware --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: When did you first see this document?
A. This document, now.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You haven't seen this before today?
A. I've not seen this before, no.
MR GREEN: Okay. Let's look, if we may, at {F/1555}. This
is a "Small project proposal", "Hot house - MoneyGram
issue", "Pricing for additional work". And then
"Description of requirement" box halfway down:
"Background:
"MoneyGram summary.
"For the last several months Post Office has
experienced a live operational issue with MoneyGram
transactions across the branch network. In the event of
a transaction timing out at the counter, a system error
message is displayed to the user ... and the transaction
is aborted. This leaves no record of the transaction at
the counter and the transactions and funds may or may
not have been committed in the MoneyGram domain. This
causes significant issues for Post Office and MoneyGram
and for customers."
And then:
"End to end testing has been commissioned to
identify the cause of the problem. Within the first
hour of testing the ATOS test team were able to identify
the issue as CDP returning an incorrectly formatted
(SOAP error message) response to the counter which
results in a system error rather than a time-out
response ..."
And if we just look at the bottom three lines of
that box:
"A quick fix has been identified by the ATOS team to
amend the existing AP-ADC reference data to treat the
system error as a time-out response and trigger the
correct counter behaviour."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So that does suggest, doesn't it, that there was a real
problem that was not very easy for the person at the
counter to deal with correctly?
A. Yes. They had an error message, but yes.
Q. This document is dated 19 October 2016, as we can see,
top right?
A. Yes, I can see that.
Q. Yes. And it is addressing something that was a result
of the January release of software?
A. Yes.
Q. So that had actually persisted for the whole of
February, March, April, June, July, August, September,
October, nearly the whole of October as well, yes?
A. From the graph you showed, yes.
Q. If Post Office had commissioned ATOS earlier -- if they
had been asked to look at it earlier, it looks as if
they would have got an answer more swiftly, because they
found it in the first hour of testing, didn't they?
A. Yes.
Q. Just looking at that from Post Office's position, does
that look satisfactory to you?
A. I don't understand why it took so long.
Q. No.
A. On the face of it, no.
Q. Let's look at other matters that you deal with in your
witness statement, if we may. Paragraphs 178 and 179
{E2/5/41}, you are talking there about volume of
branches and volume of customer sessions. You can see
that the point you make at 179 over the page {E2/5/42}
is you give the example of the Barkham branch as
an example, being the branch that Mrs Stubbs was
subpostmistress for, raises a number of matters that you
have responded to. You were able to see that the
workload for this particular branch in 2001 involved an
average of 1,047 weekly customer sessions and in 2007
this increased to 1,836, yes? And that's information
that you got from the spreadsheet that we see on the
previous page referred to there, is it?
A. Yes.
Q. Can we look please at {H/172}, which is a letter from
Post Office's solicitors dated 18 January. You will see
there the second line of 1.1 -- do you see in the
middle?
A. Yes.
Q. They are talking about your witness statement:
"It has come to our attention that this spreadsheet
contains an error due to the internal referencing that
means, while the actual volumes of customer sessions is
correct, they do not correspond correctly with the
relevant branches. We therefore write to enclose a copy
of the correct version of the volume of customer
sessions spreadsheet for your reference."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Were you made aware of that change? Do you know that
that change happened?
A. No.
Q. Okay. This may not be fair to you, but let's just look
at it. You have referred in your witness statement, we
have seen, to the Barkham branch as an example.
A. Yes.
Q. I have just shown you that the point you make about
customer sessions going up from 1,047 to 1,836. Let's
look please at the corrected spreadsheet which is at
{F/1837}.
Is this something that you actually know about, or
is this something someone asked you to put in your
statement?
A. What, the volume of branches in the --
Q. Yes? I mean is this really your evidence at all?
A. I know about branches and how they have changed over the
years, yes.
Q. Okay, so you felt comfortable giving the evidence?
A. Well, I spoke to Kjetil, a colleague of mine.
Q. Spoke to ..?
A. Kjetil.
Q. Full name?
A. Kjetil Fuglestad.
Q. That's the person you mention in your witness statement
{E2/5/41}.
A. So Kjetil manages all the data on the network, the size
of -- the number of branches, volume of transactions,
everything that goes through that; that's what he does.
Q. So he would be a reliable person to get this information
from?
A. Yes.
Q. If we look at line 254 please if we look there we can
see the Barkham branch and we can see there that the
figures between 2001 and 2007 were in fact 398 and 368;
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And they weren't the figures that you gave in your
witness statement of 1,047 and an increase up to 1,836.
So in fact they have gone down those figures, haven't
they?
A. Mm-hm. Yes.
Q. And they are quite a lot smaller?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know how that error has come about?
A. I don't. Because I had a conversation with Kjetil
around the data and then told him what I wanted and he
provided it to me, so I don't know --
Q. Could you speak up a tiny bit.
A. Sorry. I had a conversation with Kjetil around the
information that I was looking for and then he provided
it to me, so I have no idea how this data would have
changed, or been incorrect in the first place.
Q. Okay. Well, let's move on to your description of the
implementation of Horizon and Horizon Online. Let's
look at paragraph 180 of your statement please
{E2/5/42}. You say there:
"In relation to the practical implementation of
Horizon and Horizon Online in branches, Post Office
representatives were present as explained below."
Then you say at 181:
"It is my understanding that branches were required
to do their final paper based cash account before the
change over to Horizon. The information was then
transferred onto the Horizon system ..."
Using the physical cash and stock held, et cetera,
as could be agreed with the subpostmaster:
"The transfer onto Horizon was supported by the
Horizon field support officer ... and also the RNM. If
there were any issues as to discrepancies/general
functionality ... [they] would assist the branch."
Then Horizon Online, 183:
"Before the change to Horizon Online a cash check
was completed in branch by the HFSO."
That's the Horizon field support officer?
A. Yes.
Q. You have defined in 182:
"Branches were notified in advance that this cash
check would be carried out. I recall that this
mandatory cash check across the entire network caused
a temporary spike in declared losses. I suspect that
this was due to branches tidying up their accounts
before the cash check and therefore losses coming to the
surface that had previously been ignored or covered up."
Now, that doesn't on the face of it suggest any
difficulties particularly encountered by SPMs on the
introduction of either Horizon or Horizon Online,
does it, your account?
A. No, it just states what the process was, yes.
Q. Yes, it is process based, but it doesn't hint at any
difficulties they encountered that might explain a spike
in discrepancies, for example when Horizon Online was
introduced, anything like that?
A. So that was done -- so what I'm referring to there is
the spike before it went onto online.
Q. Okay.
A. So it was at the point at which it was done in advance
of and then carried over.
Q. Well, let's have a look. Let's just take a step back.
We might be able to take it more shortly. I mean do you
actually personally know what the introduction of
Horizon was actually like for the SPMs affected by it?
A. Going from paper based to Horizon, is that what you ..?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes I do.
Q. And there were quite a lot of problems, weren't there?
A. There were some. I was supporting -- when I refer to
the RNM, I was one of -- I was an RNM at the time, yes.
Q. And there were quite a lot of problems with the software
and hardware?
A. At that time I can only talk about what my experience
was.
Q. And what was your experience?
A. So we had some issues in -- where I worked in the local
area, but we were out in branch supporting and making
sure that everything was okay. So there would be the
odd -- from recollection, because it was a long time
ago, there were the odd one or two issues that we had.
I wasn't aware of the picture across the business at the
time.
Q. Okay. Let's just have a quick look, let's look at
{F/16/2} please. This is PEAK 0027887. And it is
created on 21 July 1999 and this is the one that we have
seen at the end of last week, on Thursday last week.
There's a receipts and payments misbalance which is
escalating and it gets up to £1.05 million. Do you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's quite a large number for a small branch to
have gone astray, isn't it?
A. Well, for any branch. Any branch that would be --
Q. That's not going to be a real amount of cash --
A. No.
Q. -- that the SPM has put in her pocket, is it?
A. No.
Q. Or quite a lot of stamps or anything like that?
A. No.
Q. And look at page 3 please {F/16/3}. You can see in the
bottom box:
"The initial balance brought forward for this CAP
was [1.196 million]. This was multiplied twice to give
a total ... of 2,279,189.04."
There was a £1 million discrepancy:
"This was due a known software error which has no
been resolved."
Is that "not been resolved" or "now been
resolved" --
A. I don't know.
Q. -- can you remember this one?
A. No.
Q. Okay. So that's quite a serious one. Let's have a look
at a couple more examples. {F/22} please. This is
10 November 1999. PM Dungannon. This is PEAK 0033128
and you can see there that there's a discrepancy of
£43,000. Halfway down the first box:
"Outlet has a discrepancy of £43,000 after balancing
[stock units] and doing office snapshot."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "... investigating why this misbalance occurred."
If we look at the entry for 3 December 1999, which
is down towards the bottom:
"I have talked with development ref this problem.
It is seen as a one-off. No fault can be found and
developments do not expect to be able to find a fault
with the evidence available. There is no additional
information available as evidence. I suggest this call
be placed on monitor for 1 month."
And then 18 February 2000, if we go over the page on
page 2 {F/22/2}, if you look there can you see "Further
examination of the event logs", do you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Whereabouts?
MR GREEN: It is the big box, 18 February, 17.07, my Lord,
and we come down --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, got it.
MR GREEN: "Further examination of the event logs for these
two counters indicate that counter 5 looks suspect
(C drive nearly full with big gap of no messages).
Calls from PO into HSH for period ... indicate a reboot
(counter not specified but would tie in with counter 5
event log) ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then straight after that, can you see underneath
Saturday 31 October 1999 it says:
"The evidence in the message store was that messages
continued to be written to the message store but that
all the 'payment' transactions which should have been
recorded in the rollover trailer messages failed to
appear (although others did, such as rem out and
transfer out totals). This indicates that the problem
was not one of running out of disc space but of failing
either to retrieve, or write out, transaction totals for
one particular node in the node hierarchy.
"Given that there were known problems with corrupted
persistent object indexes at about this time, it is
possible that an update on an EPOSS nodes object failed
to be registered correctly at the outlet, causing the
node accumulation to fail."
Now, on the face of it there was a £43,000
discrepancy in November 1999 and the underlying
information wasn't actually rechecked until February the
following year, on the face of this, yes?
A. That's what it looks like, yes.
Q. Let's go forward please to page 3 {F/22/3} and we're
going to look at the entry for 7 April which you can
see -- sorry, if you look at the top can you see there
there's a further occurrence for 9,000, do you see that?
A. In Appleby?
Q. Yes. And then that's then escalated and then at the
bottom of that box a fix, penultimate paragraph:
"A fix has been developed and is currently in
testing."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go down to 4 July 2000 at the bottom, it says:
"Root cause of stock unit integration problem.
"Data trees have been failing to build fully, and
the system has not been detecting this. Consequently,
discrepancies in the balancing have been occurring. In
the case of Dungannon a whole payments node was missing.
There have been a number of calls relating to this kind
of issue. A fix has been put in at CI4 which will
prevent this happening. The root cause identified ...
is as follows: 'data server trees have failed to
build ..."
So what we can see there is the sort of problem that
was being encountered is not only an error occurring but
the system failing to spot that the error was occurring,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go forward please to {F/89} we will see the
ICL Pathway customer service management support unit
monthly incident review for November 2000 and if we look
at page 6 quickly {F/89/6} -- sorry, I shouldn't -- fair
to you. If we look at page 6, do you see the second
bullet point:
"The most frequently occurring incidents in November
were both types of receipts and payments incidents
(migration and post migration) with 31 incidents per
category. The migration incidents have remained at the
same level ... post migration occurrences have
increased. This was followed by 17 transactions polled
by TIP but not by HAPS, these were due to delayed
transactions as reported ..."
And so forth. Then they were added back into normal
processing.
We can see there that at the top bullet point, key
point:
"During November the number of incidents received by
MSU increased to 109, in comparison to October where 91
received and resolved ... a total of 98 incidents were
cleared and 13 will be carried forward ..."
So there was quite a lot of activity in terms of
trying to clear incidents that were coming in of this
type, weren't there?
A. Yes.
Q. And we can see in December, which is at {F/84}, that's
the December document of the same type, let's have
a look again at page 6 quickly {F/84/6} --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I rise simply to say these
are Fujitsu documents, these are not Post Office
documents, but I'm sure your Lordship is well aware of
the limitations in this witness' ability to speak to
these documents.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, she has given broad evidence of
these types of things. You might want to just explore
when she has first seen them.
MR GREEN: Yes. Have you seen these documents before?
A. I haven't seen these.
Q. You haven't?
A. No.
Q. But you were in aware in your support role at the time
of activity of this sort going on?
A. Not in 2000 I wasn't, no.
Q. You weren't?
A. No. So in 2000 as the retail network manager I operated
in an area as part of a team of the same, so I was not
aware of this in the background.
Q. Were they giving you any feedback about the sort of
problems that Fujitsu were encountering?
A. No, no. So the process we had in place was we had
a roll-out plan of the branches that would migrate. We
organised ourselves in what we called a cluster group at
the time and we made sure that we had one of us as
an RNM was on-site to support the migration and then
subsequently some of the balances going forward as well,
because there were some issues with the balances, but
I wasn't aware of any of this in the background.
Q. So you are the person listening to the SPMs saying
"Look, I have a problem with it".
A. Yes.
Q. But you weren't being provided with any background
information --
A. No.
Q. -- about what the categories of problems being
encountered were?
A. What I would do in my role then is if I had a -- if one
of my postmasters had a problem then I would go and
check their accounts with them, go through all the
information and there was one issue that I do remember
where there was an issue with a postmaster that always
balanced and on this particular day he didn't. It was
very unusual. I checked everything and then I made
a call to Chesterfield, which wasn't called FSC then, it
was called P&BA and they resolved the problem from
there. I don't know exactly. All I know is he was
happy it was resolved.
Q. Let's look at that specific example. They didn't give
you feedback about what had gone wrong, if anything?
A. No.
Q. So you weren't able to form a view about that?
A. No. So my understanding was what to do in the
situation, if we had a situation like that, then I would
escalate it and then the process would kick in behind
because I was on to the next Post Office to support.
Q. Okay. So is it fair to say --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Just pausing there, this might speed
things up because there are two different strands you
are running at the same time.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The first thing is just a point of
clarity. I don't think these are actually Fujitsu
because I think at the time it was ICL; that's right,
isn't it?
A. That would have been at the time, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You were a retail network manager.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So the problems that you experienced,
that you had direct experience of, they were the
problems from the branches that were under your
umbrella, is that right?
A. Yes, that's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Did you get any communications back from
other areas about problems they were having, or was your
involvement solely in respect of the branches in your
area?
A. So my responsibility was the branch -- it wasn't just my
area, so I think at the time there were about eight RNMs
worked out as a team so we covered a geographical area
that would cover the whole of say Cardiff, Swansea,
West Wales, which is quite a geographical error, and
then we would talk to our counterparts in Newport and so
forth, but I'm not aware of any formal communication
back to us at the time of anything to do with this at
all, other than we were there to help postmasters
resolve the issues at the time.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Understood. And then the second point
is when you were preparing your witness statement and in
particular the paragraphs at 180 to 183 --
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- did you do any investigation in
respect of what might have been happening that you
didn't know at the time in 2000 --
A. Not back to 2000, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- or in 2010 when the change was from
Legacy Horizon to Horizon Online?
A. So in 2010 I was in a different role and had broader
responsibility and I knew what -- what we did, again we
replicated a similar approach to make sure we supported
branches at the time, but as for any detail of
information, I didn't research into that, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Right, Mr Green.
MR GREEN: I'm most grateful.
So just quickly to follow through on your role at
the time, if you just look at page {F/99.1}. Now, this
is a document about Mr Bates' branch. It's not one we
went to in the common issues trial.
A. Yes.
Q. But this is June 2001 and I think you were still an RNM,
is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is an audit of his office and can we go down
please to page 4 {F/99.1/4}. Do you see cash management
accurately declared at the close of business; you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is the sort of document you might have seen if
an audit had been done at one of your branches?
A. Yes.
Q. And if you look under "Control gaps - high risk" and
then the next one says "Comments", it says -- and this
is from the auditor:
"A correct assessment of cash holdings could not be
made because the Horizon system intermittently adds the
previous day's cash holdings to the daily declaration."
A. Right.
Q. That's the sort of problem that you might have had to
deal with if that had happened?
A. If it had happened, then yes --
Q. In one of your branches --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, can you let the witness
finish.
A. That wasn't anything I was aware of at the time.
I never encountered that problem in one of my branches,
or in my colleagues' branches; that isn't something
I was aware of.
MR GREEN: Very well. What you would have done was taken
that forward and tried to help the SPM resolve it?
A. Yes. I mean if I had an audit report from any of my --
from my branches then I would go through it in quite
some detail, yes.
Q. I'm grateful, thank you.
Can we look now at migration to Horizon Online.
Now, this is something you would have more knowledge of,
is that fair? What happened during the migration to
Horizon Online?
A. Well, I wasn't out in the field supporting it, so it
depends when you say "more involvement".
Q. Shall we just look, if we may quickly -- I will take
this reasonably quickly, just because I think you have
had a role in talking about the introduction of
Horizon Online. Let's look at {F/555} please. This is
the Horizon Online induction training document.
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at page 8 {F/555/8} can you see that
Horizon Online:
"... is about reducing the Post Office's operating
costs ..."
A. Yes.
Q. "... and is a fundamental element of forward:
three2eleven"?
A. Yes.
Q. What's "forward: three2eleven"?
A. It was the strategic plan at the time called
three2eleven, so it was -- if I remember correctly, it
was 2003 to 2011, the years.
Q. Okay. This is a 7 December 2009 document.
A. Yes.
Q. And did you have some knowledge of what that strategy
was at the time?
A. I had a knowledge because that was -- the whole business
was engaged in what that was.
Q. Yes.
A. In terms of recalling the detail of it, I can't recall
the detail of it at this point. But it was a strap line
that everybody was aware of, absolutely.
Q. Okay. We can see from the slide that Horizon Online was
based on the principle of business equivalence: "Will
look and feel very different to existing Horizon but
will not radically change transaction processes". Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it has "been designed to run on existing branch
equipment".
A. Yes.
Q. Then if you look in the notes, the sort of speaking
notes under the slide, we can see again it is reiterated
it is about reducing operating costs, yes, and that
Horizon is a major cost and then do you see it is not
about new functionality, on the left-hand margin just
above "Business equivalence"?
A. Yes.
Q. "It is based on the principle of Business equivalence.
Business equivalence is the primary design principle for
the programme - we are not about new functionality."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So this wasn't really an upgrade in terms of
functionality, was it?
A. No.
Q. It was business equivalence and a way that would be --
there would be cost savings from doing it this way --
A. Yes.
Q. -- is that fair?
A. Yes.
Q. Let's look at {F/610}. This is April 2010. This is
"Operations functional report" and if we look at the
bottom, "Horizon Online high volume pilot", you can see
a few bullet points there and the bottom one is:
"Problems reported and decision made to halt further
migrations allowing further investigation and resolution
of issues."
Now, first of all did you see this document at the
time?
A. I don't recall seeing this, no.
Q. Were you aware of these issues at the time in the pilot?
Did you know it hadn't gone --
A. No not -- no.
Q. At all?
A. No, not that I can recall, but I wasn't close to the
absolute beat rate of how things were --
Q. Okay. And did you have a look at any of this sort of
documentary history before you wrote your witness
statement?
A. No, I haven't --
Q. Research what happened?
A. So a broad understanding of what happened, but I have
not seen these documents in that respect.
Q. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, you did interrupt again.
MR GREEN: I'm so sorry.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Please don't.
MR GREEN: I'm sorry, my Lord.
If we look please at {F/588} that's PEAK 0195380 and
if we look at page 4 please {F/588/4}, 5 March 2010. In
the second box down -- do you see that?
A. In the green text, the big box?
Q. Yes, the big box.
A. Yes.
Q. "We have received notification from POL regarding the
problems at this office ... on the 1st of March at the
close of business we found that on node 5 the cash was
short of £1,000. All of the figures for that day match
the figures presented at the time of each transactions.
An instant saver withdrawal for £1,000 was transacted
that day, but I was unable to find this transaction
using the online report facility. I feel very anxious
as I believe a system error has occurred at the time of
this transaction.
"On the 2nd of March a transaction for a cash
withdrawal was completed where the system commanded
a member of staff to issue the money to the customer on
screen but the receipt printed for that transaction
printed out a decline slip. The customer was honest
enough to bring back the decline receipt a day later
with the money.
"On the 2nd of March on node 5 a £220 cash deposit
was authorised on screen but 20 minutes later the
customer brought back a receipt that stating the
transaction had declined. We contacted the NBSC as and
when the customer produced the receipt. NBSC stated
that the transaction approved on the system and had no
idea why the money was not deposited and why the decline
slip was printed.
"A rem was scanned in our system and all the figures
had doubled up. The helpline team was notified at the
time, to which they seemed more confused as to why it
happened than me!
"Another error occurred on the system when 10 items
of postage seemed to disappear for no reason halfway
through a customer's transaction. The system commanded
no money to be taken from the customer on screen or by
receipt.
"A transaction on node 2 where a car tax was entered
disappeared ..."
And so forth. Can you see?
A. Yes.
Q. This is a litany of issues that this person is raising
and it says at the bottom, about six lines up from the
bottom of that box:
"I have a deep regret in initially volunteering to
take part in this new pilot scheme, as I did not expect
to have these complications with such poor services from
the helpline.
"Unfortunately our migration officer is away ...
leaving us with no one with the means to correct our
issue today. Why should it be my liability to recoup
all the losses in this already declining business, when
these systems should have adequate contingencies for any
such problems that could or would arrive. It seems that
the helpline have left me for seven hours now without
any intention of calling us back as no one again wants
to take ownership over this problem."
Now, pausing there, were you aware at all of that
level of difficulty being encountered by people who had
volunteered for the pilot for Horizon Online?
A. No.
Q. Let's look at {F/614} please. This is a Post Office
document. It is Horizon Online programme update,
8 April 2010, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And can we go to page 4 please {F/614/4}. You can see
there 614 branches live, almost 90% have a router
installed, high volume pilot suspended, NFSP have raised
concerns but remain supportive, business case and
benefits secure, Fujitsu initiated red alert and
independent reviews. Were you made aware of that within
Post Office?
A. No.
Q. Let's have a look at {F/639} please, the following
month, May 2010. If we go to page 6 please {F/639/6}
because quite a lot of it is redacted. We can see that
the document is authored by Paula Vennells, the network
director, and if we come back to page 3 {F/639/3}:
"Executive correspondence (flag cases): the
executive correspondence team are still receiving some
letters from MPs despite the current purdah. Each case
is dealt with individually ensuring that we tackle any
relevant customer issues but stay within current purdah
guidelines. Internally we are dealing with requests
from subpostmasters who would like compensation in
relation to closures following the Horizon issues over
the Easter period."
Were you aware there had been Horizon issues over
the Easter period in 2010?
A. Not that I can recall, no.
Q. Okay. Did you see this document, can you remember?
A. It would be hard to recognise it now, wouldn't it?
Q. It's very difficult, I agree.
A. So I don't think I did.
Q. Sort of striped with redactions, it's difficult.
At {F/930} we've got a pack for James Arbuthnot and
Oliver Letwin meeting scheduled for 17 May and if we
look at page 2 of that {F/930/2} we can see who the
attendees were: James Arbuthnot, who was then an MP for
North East Hampshire, Oliver Letwin, Alice Perkins, the
chairman of the Post Office, Paula Vennells, the
chief executive, Susan Crichton and Lesley Sewell and
then case review, Mr Ismay and yourself.
A. That's correct.
Q. And this was essentially the planning pack for that
meeting, wasn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at page 3 please {F/930/3}, in item 1,
fourth bullet point, it says:
"We are open to feedback and we will provide you the
information we have available, our aim is to be open and
transparent."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And the plan was that that was to be said at the
meeting. And if we look at page 12 {F/930/12} you can
see there under "Background" do you see:
"In 2010 Horizon underwent an upgrade. The upgraded
system was tested and has the full support of the NFSP."
Bottom hole punch?
A. Yes.
Q. It wasn't really an upgrade from the perspective of
functionality for SPMs, was it, as we have already
identified?
A. No, agreed.
Q. And that doesn't give a completely clear explanation of
that, does it?
A. No, it is quite limited in what it says there.
Q. And it could be read as meaning it had been upgraded
from their perspective when the truth was it hadn't?
A. Yes. I mean I don't know what was said around that
because I wasn't in the whole of the meeting.
Q. And then it says:
"The upgraded system was tested and has the full
support of the NFSP."
It is true, as far as we can tell from the
documents, that NFSP was still supportive, but they had
actually raised concerns about it, hadn't they?
A. Yes.
Q. We saw that on page 4 of {F/614}. So that doesn't give
the complete picture to the MPs either if that's what
was said?
A. If that's what was said, because I wasn't party to that
conversation.
Q. Let's look please now at {F/658} please. It is the
functional report operations, June 2010, and on page 1
you can see Horizon Online:
"Successful completion to pilot of new
Horizon Online migration package.
"Horizon Online high volume pilot successfully
recommenced."
So what had happened there was that the halt that
had been placed on it had been lifted so it could
recommence, is that fair?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is something that you must have known about at
this time, is that fair? You know the --
A. Sorry, I don't recall ...
Q. No? You didn't know that the pilot had been stopped and
then recommenced?
A. I don't recall that it had actually been stopped and
recommenced, no.
Q. Let's look on page 2 please {F/658/2}:
"Horizon Online losses: over the last month a small
number of branches have raised concerns in regard to
system integrity and the creation of losses. So far no
evidence of system integrity issues has been found."
Were you aware that branches were raising system
integrity issues at this time?
A. No, I don't recall any information flowing out of that.
Q. Let's look please at {F/657} which is the network
functional report, June 2010 and if we look at page 3
please {F/657/3}, Horizon Online, we've got:
"High volume pilot resumed, 100 Crowns migrated with
further 170 Crowns planned this week.
"Ongoing delay to the programme impacting on
resource available to deliver migration support.
Support team continually reducing as people leave on VR
terms ..."
That's voluntary redundancy, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. So the support team was reducing because of voluntary
redundancies, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "Initiating contingencies (eg more subpostmasters) but
to deliver the roll-out as planned we will now refuse
any further requests for people to leave the team to
take up roles in POL."
So that was one facet of provision of support to
SPMs who were affected by some of these issues, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go forward please to {F/708} this is a period
12 09/10 sales report. What is period 12? Just to
orientate ourselves by date?
A. That would be March.
Q. That would be March?
A. Yes.
Q. Of 2010?
A. We run April to March in our periods, yes.
Q. April to March, okay. So March 2010 it looks as if
we're in. And if we can go please to page 8 of that
document {F/708/8}:
"Horizon migration - a number of issues have
occurred with the data centre which have impacted [or]
have affected live service to all Horizon Online
branches. Following on from this a decision has now
been made to extend the duration of the pilot period to
allow for further testing to be undertaken on the
system. As a consequence the planned date for the full
roll-out schedule to commence has now been postponed
until satisfactory progress has been made in achieving
stability of branches within the pilot."
Did you have any visibility of this at the time? If
you didn't I can take it even more swiftly.
A. I must have had some but I can't recall to be honest.
Q. You can't recall. Did you look at any of this history
to --
A. No, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: To what?
MR GREEN: In order to give the description you give in your
witness statement?
A. Sorry, that's what I understood.
Q. That's what you understood?
A. Yes and the answer was no.
Q. I will take it a little bit more quickly then. If you
just go forward all the way to {F/1402}. This is an
extract from "Lessons Learned log" and under the area
"Audits" at 4.1 we can see certain complaints about
audits and so forth:
"Existing branch discrepancies not discovered during
audit of branch".
And so forth. And "Rationale for change:
"Postmasters perceive a lack of knowledge of person
conducting branch audit.
"POL needs to be confident that colleagues
performing audits are competent and there is confidence
across the network.
"POL need to be able to have clear sight of
losses/gains throughout the network."
Is this a document you are familiar with?
A. Yes.
Q. It is from 11 November 2015. It has your name at the
bottom left-hand corner, hasn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Were you the author of the document?
A. Yes.
Q. You were?
A. Yes.
Q. And what was the purpose of this document?
A. So the purpose was to look at any areas that I thought
we could improve. So at this time -- so we had been --
so we had -- branch support programme had been running,
we had done the initial complaint to the mediation
scheme and we had some business as usual areas that we
were investigating, some issues as well, so what I took
the opportunity to do then was look at what I believed
were enhancements/improvements that we could make to how
we operated to better support postmasters.
Q. And let's just identify the column headings. The
left-hand column is area, the second column is "Issue
identified", the third column is "Rationale for change"
and the fourth column is "Consideration for
Post Office"?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go forward please to page 5 {F/1402/5}, 9.2:
"Failure to be open and honest when issues arise eg
roll out of Horizon, HNGx migration issues/issues
affecting few branches no the seemingly publicised."
A. Yes.
Q. That was something you were specifically aware of,
wasn't it?
A. So that was out of -- there were some cases that we had
investigated as part of the mediation scheme.
Q. So you knew that there had been an issue about failing
to be open and honest during both the roll-out of
Horizon itself and the migration to HNGx which is
Horizon Online, yes?
A. Yes. But it was from a very limited source, it was just
from what I had investigated as part of this.
Q. So in your investigations you didn't look at any of the
sorts of documents that I have been showing you?
A. No.
Q. And do you accept that they might have helped to inform
you as to the extent to which those complaints were
justified?
A. Yes.
Q. If you had looked into it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the next box across says:
"Need to understand and action learnings from
Horizon, HNGx roll-out ..."
We can't see what that says. Without saying
anything that's privileged, what is the point you are
making there, in as far as you are able to tell
the court?
A. Sorry, in which part, the middle bit?
Q. No, the top bit, where you say "Need to understand and
action learnings from Horizon, HNGx roll-out ..."
A. So what I was trying to say was a broad -- a broad
concept really of as we do things across the business
then we should always look to see what lessons we could
take from whatever we do, in some cases they could be
very small things and in other cases they could be
larger things and this was a document then that I was
handing over into the business as usual environment as
a lessons learned, so "These are what we have observed
and these are the things that we would suggest", which
is why it said "for Post Office consideration".
Q. Because you go on in the bottom of that box to say:
"Adopting a mindset of that no hidden agenda/no
'skeletons in cupboard' will demonstrate that lessons
have been learned from Horizon, HNGx ... and business
shows its willingness to change."
A. Yes.
Q. You felt that would be an important change, didn't you,
and a helpful one?
A. Yes.
Q. What's proposed to do in the right-hand box is:
"Use standard communications in branch to reinforce
consistent message to customers and stakeholders."
And:
"Engage champions of POL and stakeholders throughout
the process of change."
That didn't actually specify any particular measures
for openness or transparency, did it?
A. No. No, that was quite broad. I mean so these were say
areas of consideration, they weren't really specific.
In some cases I would have been more specific, in others
I was being quite broad. What I meant by that were
things around -- so the branch user forum, for instance,
is actually bringing in postmasters and people from
within the business to take their B1 input and to
share -- to get their insight into things. That was in
a broad sense.
Q. Do you know what happened to that proposal? What action
was taken, if any, to implement what you had suggested?
A. I don't -- I don't know what happened to that one.
Q. Is there any evidence that you are aware of something
actually happening?
A. With branch user forum, yes, things did happen, as you
have seen and that was a very, very open forum and that
was used to engage particularly product managers or any
changes that were happening to the network would come to
the branch user forum and share in confidence a very
early view and take input and that kind of fed through
in terms of the new technology. IBM we were talking to
at the time in the front office and also the hardware
swap out that we did later on as well. Those are the
kind of things.
So some of it did happen, but I can't say I have
tracked that through.
Q. Is it fair to say in the branch user forum, when we
actually look at the branch user forum logs a lot of
that is actually feedback from SPMs to Post Office,
rather than Post Office saying "Look, we're aware that
this has gone wrong and so" --
A. It changed actually. So when it was first set up it
very much was that, so it was taking a lot of input from
postmasters and there was a Crown VM there as well, an
ABM, so it was across the business. It was a lot of
taking input and then it changed. As it got more --
I suppose as everybody got more comfortable and we
addressed some small areas and some quick wins in that,
it changed then to being seen as the forum to come to
get input to things like, you know, the new hardware,
the keyboard, the layout of the keys, for instance, on
the keyboard, even down to that basic level around what
that layout should look like in terms of the operation,
but other things as well.
Q. So sort of just looking at a practical point on that is
if you have buttons very close together to each other
which can easily be confused, that tends to increase the
risk of miskeys, doesn't it?
A. No, what it was on this -- there were two or three
keyboards that were being considered, size, shape, and
what we were asking -- you know, postmasters in the
forum, the users, "From how you operate the system,
which keyboard suits you better around the functionality
of easy of operation?"
Q. You mean a normal keyboard --
A. Yes.
Q. -- not how it is presented on the Horizon scene?
A. This was about the hardware, which was --
Q. Not the touch screen?
A. So that would be the software. This was about the
hardware.
Q. Okay. Let's briefly turn, if we may --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Now, Mr Green, I am going to suggest you
stop now.
MR GREEN: I will.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: We've got a number of matters to deal
with.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This is going to take about ten minutes.
You are very welcome to stay in the witness box if you
would like to, but you don't have to. You are still
going to be giving evidence tomorrow so please don't
discuss the case.
A. Of course.
Housekeeping
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I have some items and then we will come
back to some of the other items.
Mr De Garr Robinson, I am going to ask you to do
a task please, which is a redaction review. I have been
noting the different documents that have been redacted
and it seems to me that some of them are crying out for
a review by leading counsel of the basis on which they
have been redacted. I will just go through the list.
There is F/1549, F/1225, F/1664, F/610, F/639, F/658,
F/657, F/708 and F/1402.
I'm obviously not going to impose a time on you and
perhaps tomorrow you could just give me an update as to
how long you think it might take you. It might be
necessary to recall witnesses, hopefully it won't be,
but in the first instance I'd like you to review those
reactions please.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes, so it is F/1549, F/1664,
F/1225, F/610, F/639, F/658, F/657 and F/1402.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And there was F/708 as well.
The first couple appeared I think probably at the
beginning of the afternoon, the last half a dozen have
all been within the last 25 minutes.
That's the first point. The second point is --
I mean simply as an example, Mr De Garr Robinson, to
explain, F/708 is the monthly sales report
for March 2012. It has got quite a few redactions in
it. All of those I'm asking for a specific reason
I just think they are -- it is sensible to have it
reviewed.
Secondly, there's the outstanding point relating to
7/8/9 May which I mentioned at the end of last week. Do
any of you have any issues with it being the Tuesday and
Wednesday rather than --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I have no issues with the 7th or the
8th.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I didn't think you would have. Thank
you very much. Mr Green?
MR GREEN: My Lord, one member of our team can't do the 7th
at all and it is not easy for the rest of us but we can
do it.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, 7th and 8th then, I'm afraid.
It is going to have to be.
MR GREEN: I understand.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, that's true of both -- I have
similar issues but ...
MR JUSTICE FRASER: As far as I'm concerned, unless it was
physically impossible it's going to be the Tuesday and
Wednesday, so it's going to be the 7th and 8th.
MR GREEN: We understand.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will keep -- because I'm in an
indulgent mood I will keep the time for your lodging
your closings as it was before. So you won't lose
a day.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm afraid I have forgotten when our
closings are due.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I believe it was -- well, Mr Green is
about to tell me when it was. Do you remember when it
was?
MR GREEN: I've got it I think in a different notebook.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I think your junior behind you is trying
to ...
MR GREEN: My Lord, I think your Lordship had a day in mind.
I'm not sure we actually crystallised what it was.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I don't remember a day being actually
specified.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, then, that's my fault and
I apologise.
MR GREEN: It may be ours.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will give you until noon on the Friday
before.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: That's very kind of your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Because I have taken a working day off
you, so that's up to me. And the Monday is in any case
a bank holiday but that's not a problem from my point of
view. So noon on the Friday before, which I think is
3 May.
Right, well, that -- just give me one second. Are
we having an opposed application at 10 o'clock tomorrow
for a third party disclosure order against Royal Mail?
MR GREEN: My Lord, I was expecting that Mr Warwick would be
coming over to do that at 10 o'clock.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's why I'm asking.
MR GREEN: Precisely.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I don't have the witness statement that
you issued in respect -- I don't need it this minute but
if you have got one --
MR GREEN: We've got a copy just in case --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Right, hand that up please.
MR GREEN: I'm afraid it has not been hole-punched.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That doesn't matter.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I have literally just been passed
a yellow sticker saying "Some E&Y audits have arrived".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, well, you can update me
tomorrow, or through my clerk later on.
MR GREEN: I'm most grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But these are the papers for tomorrow at
10 o'clock?
MR GREEN: My Lord, they are.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you know -- we will just have to take
that as and when.
MR GREEN: If we find out anything this afternoon we will
let your learned clerk now and then --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, that's excellent.
That's all my housekeeping.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I have one piece of
housekeeping which is your Lordship asked for an order
to be prepared reflecting what your Lordship indicated
this morning about the witness statement.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes please.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Could I hand this up and then I will
hand it to my learned friend.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Thank you very much indeed.
(Pause).
I have just signed that -- well, I have read it,
checked it, signed it. I will give it to my clerk and
it will be sealed by the QB.
So no more housekeeping?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, there is one other matter
which is one of my witnesses, Mr Membery. Your Lordship
may recall from the PTR that he has a serious illness
and your Lordship may recall that we indicated that he
would be having tests in hospital this week and we would
do our best to ensure that it was possible. My Lord, he
is currently due to be giving evidence on Wednesday.
The difficulty is he is in hospital today for tests --
this is to do with prostate cancer and --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: There is no need to go into -- you don't
have to go into details.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: But he has been told that he needs to
attend for further tests tomorrow and Wednesday.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: And at the moment he is not sure
whether he will be needed on Thursday as well.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will tell you what we should do with
him, there is flexibility in the timetable next week,
without -- I don't want that gentleman to feel under any
pressure at all.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Take instructions, if with some sensible
interleaving or creating of what I imagine based on the
length of his witness statement is not going to be more
than half a day at the most if not probably an hour with
Mr Green, that could be fitted in either the week we're
not sitting, or if necessary some other time. But
I don't want him to feel under pressure to come here if
he is actually in hospital at the moment.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm very grateful to your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: We will deal with that creatively.
Mr Green, anything from you?
MR GREEN: My Lord, the only thing that occurred to me, just
thinking about the sticker that has just arrived --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The sticker?
MR GREEN: Sorry, the E&Y audits that apparently some have
now been received. Would your Lordship be amenable to
us requesting, if appropriate, that what's due to be
heard tomorrow morning at 10 might be postponed until
the following morning at 10 if it looks as if we are
likely to have greater clarity on it?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, but you will have to take relevant
steps with Royal Mail and whoever they have
instructed --
MR GREEN: My Lord, of course.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And you will have to notify the court.
MR GREEN: It may be easier just to come at 10 tomorrow and
get it clear.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Let's put it this way: I'm here anyway
from quite a lot earlier than 10 so it is not a problem
for me to come down at 10 and go back upstairs and I'm
flexible. But you have my clerk's email address so it
is not an issue. If you would rather do it on
Wednesday -- well, just see how the land lies and just
decide.
MR GREEN: I'm grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But if it is to be moved from the date
in the order I made on Friday, you will have to notify
Royal Mail of that.
MR GREEN: My Lord, we would of course do that.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: What I don't want is Royal Mail coming
at very short notice and the claimants not being here.
MR GREEN: Of course.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right. Is that everything?
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Thank you all very much.
Actually there is one point I should add to
everyone. If there is an opposed application tomorrow
at 10 o'clock, Mrs van den Bogerd, there is an outside
chance that we might not be ready to resume your
evidence bang on 10.30.
A. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So please don't be concerned about that.
If you turn up and you look through the window and you
see -- I mean it will be open to the public, but you
probably won't want to come in given you will be giving
your evidence. If we're not able to start bang on 10.30
with you then I will probably start at say quarter to
11, but if the Royal Mail do come tomorrow, I imagine it
won't take a full 30 minutes, so it probably won't
arise, but just to tip you off basically, so you don't
worry that we have started without you.
Right, so, 10 o'clock for you, 10.30 potentially
10.45 for the Post Office, unless you want to sit in on
the Royal Mail. Thank you all very much.
(4.32 pm)
(The court adjourned until 10.00 am on Tuesday,
19 March 2019)
(10.30 am)
Housekeeping
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, good morning. It is my turn
to be leading evidence. There are a few housekeeping
matters for me to raise with your Lordship and there
might be some your Lordship would like to raise with me.
My points for your Lordship. On Day 2 Mr Latif and
Mr Tank gave evidence. Your Lord will recall that
Mr Latif referred to some memo views that he received in
January 2018. My Lord, those have now been found and
disclosed.
My Lord, secondly in relation to Mr Latif there was
a reference to an audit that was done at his branch, the
Caddington branch. That audit report has now been
disclosed and indeed it is now in the trial bundles.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are any of the memo views in the trial
bundles?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Not yet, my Lord. They were found and
disclosed over the weekend.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are they going in, do you know?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, my expectation is that they will
go in unless --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I in particular would like to look for
and look at at least one or two of them, so ...
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes.
My Lord, Mr Tank, your Lordship will recall that he
was shown a Horizon Online quick reference guide and
suggested he had never seen a document like that before,
the version he was used to was much shorter. The
reference guide which was in force at the time of the
events in question had already been disclosed but it is
now in the bundle, my Lord, at {F/691.1}.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And that's the one that was in force at
the time Mr Tank --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes. It is dated 11 August -- I say
dated, when it was disclosed it was disclosed with the
date 11 August 2010.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And that I think related to a passage of
evidence where I observed that the court had seen
a different version of the reference guide.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, I think your Lordship had seen
perhaps a shorter one in the common issues trial. This
is the long version. There is no real, as far as I can
see, substantive difference between the one that was put
to Mr Latif and the one that's now in the bundles.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Does that deal with all your
housekeeping?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Those are mine, my Lord.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, do you have any?
MR GREEN: My Lord, there is the Royal Mail application in
the background but I don't want to trouble your Lordship
with it now.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That is something on my list and I would
like to raise it now, not in respect of that but in
respect of the correspondence at the end of last week.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr De Garr Robinson, obviously you know
about this because you communicated it to the court as
soon as you found out.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: My understanding and do correct me if
I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure that this is correct, is
that what the court was told on Thursday about the
Royal Mail have the E&Y pre-2011 audit reports and being
unwilling to disclose them was incorrect, is that
a correct understanding?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes, subject to this
important clarification. My Lord, there had been --
there's a confusion on my side of the court. Audit
related documents had been requested from Royal Mail and
Royal Mail had indicated that they were reluctant to
provide anything without the protection of a court
order. Then the confusion was that it was thought that
the audit related documents that had been requested and
had met with that response were the actual audit reports
prior to 2011 and that was the mistake and that was not
the case. There had not actually been a discussion with
Royal Mail about those specific documents, which is why
it's only right that my instructing solicitors have
apologised to Freeths and I have apologised to
your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes. The situation vis-à-vis the
Royal Mail seems to me to fall into two categories, one
of which we can come on to deal with later, the other
one of which I want to deal with now.
The part we can come on to deal with later relates
to the third party disclosure application that I made an
order in respect of on Thursday and you have now
confirmed my understanding. There are some documents
that the Royal Mail has relating to audit in respect of
which an order may prove to be necessary. That
tributary can meander along or not in line with the
proper procedure in the CPR which was initiated at the
end of last week. I assume that that application was
served in accordance with my order.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes. I think the deadline for service
is today.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The second point is the actual pre-2011
Ernst & Young reports. My updated understanding of that
derives solely from what I was told last week, the
letter of correction from Freeths on 15 March and what
you have told me and it seems to me that the position is
as follows, that the Post Office still has not disclosed
those reports because it does not believe it has got
them, is that correct?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Yes, it hasn't been able to find them.
It has looked for them and not been able to find them,
my Lord.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I am therefore going to order a witness
statement please from your solicitors and I'm just going
to identify what that witness statement has to deal
with, because at the moment it seems know there is a bit
too much generalism in these letters of explanation that
say "The Post Office believed" or "The Post Office asked
for", so I'm going to condescend to particulars. I'm
just going to read out what the witness statement -- and
we will come on to the time and date that this has to be
served at the end of this little passage.
I would like a witness statement from the
Post Office, and I imagine that will be from Mr Parsons,
which deals with the following: 1, the steps taken by
reference to the specific individuals who have
instructed or directed those steps, in order to obtain
copies of the pre-2011 Ernst & Young reports; 2, if
those steps have led to a conclusion that the
Post Office does not have those reports in its custody,
possession or control, an explanation as to how that can
be the case; 3, identification of what requests, if any,
have been made to Ernst & Young before today's date --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Does your Lordship mean Royal Mail?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, I have just said identification of
what requests have been made by the Post Office --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: To?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: To Ernst & Young, who produced them,
before today to obtain copies of those reports.
4, exactly the same in respect of Royal Mail, in
other words identification of what requests have been
made to Royal Mail. 5, if no such requests have been
made either to Ernst & Young and/or Royal Mail, an
explanation of how that comes to be the case. And then
6, which is effectively the catch-all, which is a copy
please of an immediate request that will be made today
in writing to Ernst & Young and to the Royal Mail for
copies of these documents.
Now, just pausing there, the explanation for that,
Mr De Garr Robinson -- and I know I don't have to give
the explanation for your purposes, but just to be
clear -- I can't conceive of a situation whereby copies
of those reports are not available in this litigation.
If for some reason due to the corporate reorganisation
in 2011 it is the case that they are unavailable, well,
then steps are going to have to be taken to produce
them.
I would like that order drawing up today please.
Would you like to tell me of a suitable time and date by
which that witness statement has to be -- or ought to be
provided?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, could I glance back and take
instructions?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Of course you can.
(Pause).
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Would your Lordship be happy with
10.30 on Thursday morning?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I am happy, subject to the following
observation: depending on what the outcome is, it may be
necessary to recall witnesses in respect of this,
but for the moment 10.30 on which ..?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Thursday morning.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I'm going to make it 9.30 on Thursday
morning so that if there's anything arising out of it it
can be dealt with on Thursday morning. So that is the
21st.
Right, so that's that. There are a range of other
housekeeping type matters but they can all wait until
the end of today.
Right, so ...
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I call Angela van den Bogerd.
MS ANGELA VAN DEN BOGERD (affirmed)
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do have a seat, Mrs Van den Bogerd,
please.
Examination-in-chief by MR DE GARR ROBINSON
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Mrs van den Bogerd, there will be file
that you have in front of you. Could I ask you to go to
tab 5 of that file please and you will see on the first
page of the document in front of you is a witness
statement that is said to be made by you. Is that your
name and address on page 1 of that statement? {E2/5/1}
A. Yes, it's mine.
Q. If I could ask you to go to the last page of the same
tab, page 44 {E2/5/44}, is that your signature?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And still in the same bundle I would like you to go
please to what I hope is tab 16 {E4/16/1}.
A. Tab 16?
Q. Yes.
A. Empty.
Q. It is empty.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It might be at the front of the tab.
That's where mine was.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: If I could ask you to go back to
tab 5, Mrs van den Bogerd. I'm misleading you horribly,
I do apologise. Is there a series of corrections to
your statement at the front?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you seen those corrections before?
A. Yes, I have.
Q. Subject to those corrections, is this witness statement
true to the best of your knowledge, recollection and
belief?
A. It is.
Q. You will be asked some questions now, if you could wait
there.
Cross-examination by MR GREEN
MR GREEN: I think the statement on the screen is the one
from the column issues trial, so probably the one we
want up is {E2/5/1} please.
Mrs van den Bogerd, this is a statement that you
made in November 2018, isn't it?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And if you look at page 44 {E2/5/44}, it is signed on
16 November 2018?
A. That's correct.
Q. Can we go to page 2 of that statement please {E2/5/2}.
Now, at paragraph 5 you will see there you have
explained a common theme in your responses in this
witness statement and you say that the common theme:
"... is that the evidence put forward by the
claimants does not concern a bug, defect or error in
Horizon (ie a Horizon generated shortfall as defined in
paragraph 41.6 of Post Office's generic defence)."
And then you say this:
"They often appear to assume that alleged losses,
shortfalls or other problems must have been caused by
Horizon."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. So that's a part of the common theme of your witness
statement, isn't it?
A. It is, yes.
Q. And then you say:
"Given the unspecific nature of many of the
allegations made and that some relate to things that are
said to have occurred years ago, it is not now possible
in this statement for me (and may not be possible for
anyone else) to definitively state what may or may not
have happened in each case."
And then you say:
"Instead, my evidence aims to give the court
a balanced view of the range of possible causes behind
each allegation ..."
Now, was that your aim in November 2018, to give
the court a balanced view?
A. It was, yes.
Q. Do you feel you have succeeded?
A. Well, I made some references and set out alternative
explanations to causes of the losses.
Q. So you feel you did broadly succeed, do you?
A. Broadly.
Q. And then you explain the reason for that. You say:
"... because I believe that, assuming the basic
facts alleged by the claimants are true, there is
a plausible and much more likely explanation than the
problem being caused by Horizon."
And you say:
"The most common alternative explanation is that
there may have been an accounting mistake or a user
error by the subpostmaster, his assistants or
Post Office."
Correct?
A. Correct.
Q. There is one particular example we will come to where
you say it is a data entry error by Post Office, but it
is fair to say, isn't it, that broadly your witness
statement is actually pointing to the likelihood of
errors made by subpostmasters or their assistants?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, you have made some corrections which we've got in
the document that you were referred to and can we just
look at the types of corrections you have made. There
are some corrections which relate to matters that you
probably realised some time ago. If we look at
paragraph 128 of your witness statement on page
{E2/5/30}. Just to give you context, this is in the
passage that begins on page 28 dealing with Pam Stubbs'
case and if we go back to page 30 and look at
paragraph 128 you see there it says:
"The FSC customer account (ie the record of all
branch discrepancies, TCs, credits and debits on the
subpostmaster's account) confirms that Mrs Stubbs chose
to settle ..."
Is what you originally said:
"... this shortfall centrally and so this does not
appear to be a problem with Horizon as I would expect
Mrs Stubbs to dispute this shortfall if Horizon was
thought to be the cause."
Yes?
A. That's correct.
Q. Now, taking it in stages, let's just look carefully if
you can first of all at two aspects of what you have
chosen to correct now. If we look at -- I'm sorry we're
going to have to go back between the documents because
we haven't got it all in one place, but if we look at
{E2/16/4} and the second box down relates to
paragraph 128 of your witness statement, doesn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's the paragraph we have just been looking at
and what you now say is that Mrs Stubbs settled this
shortfall centrally, full stop.
A. Yes.
Q. And you have deleted:
"... and so this does not appear to be a problem
with Horizon as I would expect Mrs Stubbs to dispute
this shortfall if Horizon was thought to be the cause."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And you must have realised that -- at the latest you
must have realised that that correction was necessary
after the common issues trial and you had heard her
evidence?
A. Yes.
Q. And the reason it was necessary -- two important points
of correction there. The first one is that the words
"chose to settle" are very misleading, aren't they, in
the context of accepting the transaction correction?
A. Yes. Because she did actually dispute it via the
contracts (inaudible), which I didn't know.
Q. Well, yes, let's take it in stages. There are two
different points. The phrase "chose to settle
centrally", the choice is pay or settle centrally
effectively, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And there's no dispute button, as we have already
established in the previous trial. So there's no
dispute button on Horizon and that's why you have
amended what you previously said, that she chose to
central centrally, you have taken the word "chose" out
because it is not a real choice for the subpostmaster,
is it?
A. So the reason I took it out here is because when I wrote
this I said she chose to settle it because she didn't
dispute it at the time and that's why I wrote it as
I did. What I subsequently found is that she did
dispute, albeit later, so therefore it was incorrect, as
I had stated.
Q. Right, well, I will take it quite quickly because we
have already dealt with this in the previous trial but
the short point is however much you dispute something,
the maximum you can do on Horizon to dispute it is to
press "settle centrally"?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, that's an example of a correction you have made
from something you would have known a long time ago.
There's another one at paragraph 145 of your witness
statement on page {E2/5/33}. This relates to
Mr Abdulla's case. You see paragraph 145 there?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. This is talking about transaction corrections in the sum
of £1,092 for two consecutive months and you will
remember that in fact what we found was there were in
fact three successive entries of 1,092 on the
spreadsheet, weren't there?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you remember? So what you have done is you have
corrected the word "over" in the fourth line down just
after "relevant" to "under" and you have nonetheless
decided to maintain Post Office's position that although
there were three identical items, month after month, for
£1,092, it's only the third one that was in error?
A. Yes.
Q. So you don't accept that the second one was in error?
A. No.
Q. So the second one is a coincidence, two 1,092. The
third coincidence is a coincidence too far, is that
right, because that's the one you corrected?
A. So the first two were the same figure for two months.
Q. Two months running.
A. Yes. And the third one was issued mistakenly and that's
why the correcting TC was issued to correct that, from
the evidence then there's two on there that should
stand.
Q. I see, and so that's a correction of the word but not
the outcome in terms of where you would lay the blame
for that?
A. Yes, that's correct.
Q. And then the other sort of correction we've got is
corrections of evidence that you have only recently
heard -- you were in court, weren't you, for the
evidence of Angela Burke?
A. I was, but actually for Angela Burke I had already made
that correction to my solicitors before I heard that
evidence.
Q. So hold on a second, you had already decided to make the
correction you have made in relation to Angela Burke
before she gave evidence?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. But let's just have a look at that, if we may.
So it is paragraph 104 of your witness statement, which
is {E2/5/25} and there you are dealing with the fact
that there were two other items left in the stack.
A. Correct.
Q. And it says, four lines up from the bottom:
"Mrs Burke did not do this [ie clear the stack] and
bundled together two customers' transactions into one
basket ... from Horizon's perspective this would have
looked like a set of transactions relevant to a single
customer."
Yes?
A. Yes and that's still correct.
Q. And the addition that you have made, if I can just read
it out, it is -- thank you very much, very efficient.
We can see the addition that you have made on
paragraph 104 at the bottom {E2/16/3}.
A. Yes.
Q. "However this had no bearing on the failed recovery of
the £150 cash withdrawal."
A. That's correct.
Q. Now, did you think it was odd then that Mrs Burke was
extensively cross-examined on the basis of your evidence
that you had already decided required modification?
A. So my understanding of the way that Mrs Burke was
cross-examined was that that was not actually put to her
in those words but that Mr Draper did say to her that he
understood that that didn't have a bearing on the 150,
that's my recollection.
Q. Let's take it in stages. We've got the reference to the
transcripts, but very briefly, the point that was being
made to Mrs Burke was if you leave transactions in the
stack for longer you are leaving a longer period during
which an error might occur in relation to that basket.
A. And that is --
Q. That's the thrust of it.
A. And that is correct, yes.
Q. But the point was completely obvious from her own
witness statement on a fair reading of it, that it was
the last transaction that had gone astray so it had no
bearing whatever, did it?
A. In this situation it didn't because it was a failed
recovery.
Q. And you accept that your original witness statement as
drafted did not make clear that you were not suggesting
that any error by her had any effect on it?
A. That's correct. When I put my witness statement
together I did say that I hadn't done all the detail
I would ordinarily have done, I didn't have as much time
to do that and I have looked at other evidence in
relation to Mrs Burke and what was very clear to me is
that Mrs Burke had done absolutely nothing wrong in that
situation.
Q. You didn't say that, did you? The reason I'm asking
this a little bit carefully is because you introduce
your witness statement and focus on the likely reason
being user error and that's the tenor of what we're then
expecting to read about?
A. Yes.
Q. So when you don't point out she has done absolutely
nothing wrong, the natural way of reading your witness
statement is that she had done something wrong in some
way?
A. I agree, which is why --
Q. And that's why you have corrected it now?
A. Absolutely, yes.
Q. But it was completely clear from her witness statement,
wasn't it, that it was the last transaction that failed?
A. Yes.
Q. And the reason it was clear was she actually exhibited
a copy of the receipt so when you looked at her witness
statement there was an exhibit with a copy of the
receipt and you could see it was the last transaction?
A. Yes.
Q. Then if we just look at the change made to paragraph 72
please, back one page on that document on Opus
{E2/16/2}, this is in relation to Mr Patny and his
difficulties with MoneyGram:
"Mr Patny is correct that on 23 February 2016 he
processed a MoneyGram transaction for £3,100 and the
customer's debit card payment for the transaction was
declined by the customer's bank. At this point the
transaction was committed and could not be removed from
the stack, therefore Mr Patny had to settle to cash.
Process is that the MoneyGram transaction should have
been cancelled on Horizon followed by a reversal of the
transaction. The data shows that Mr Patny cancelled the
transaction, however did not complete the reversal.
This would result in the £3,100 loss."
Now, what you said at the time was a little more
doubtful, you just recite what he is saying he did
rather than accepting it.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. And --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can I just ask you to pause there just
for a technical reason. I have been working off the
hard copy of Mrs van den Bogerd's corrections, which
seems to be different to the one that's on the common
screen. Are there two different versions?
Mrs van den Bogerd, the clip of documents which
Mr De Garr Robinson took you to, is that three sheets in
length?
A. It is three sheets I have in front of me.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It is three sheets?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can we just scroll to the end of
{E2/16/4} and see how many pages long that is.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I'm using the one that is the common one
for all witnesses. We have one for each witness and --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's a perfect explanation. As long
as there is only one version of the document.
MR GREEN: There is only one version.
Because what you actually said in your witness
statement was that you were assuming the facts that the
claimants alleged were true.
A. Yes.
Q. And it is only after hearing Mr Patny's evidence and the
fact that the helpline did tell him to settle to cash
that you have changed this, isn't it?
A. No, so again my corrections were made in advance of the
claimants giving their evidence last week. So I put
this in to my solicitors before the trial started.
Q. Right, so we have only found out about it after they
have been cross-examined?
A. Yes.
Q. I see.
A. I did put it in before.
Q. I understand, thank you very much.
Can we move on to the first section in your witness
statement please where you respond briefly to points
made by Mr Henderson. Now, you were familiar with
Mr Henderson's role with Second Sight?
A. I was.
Q. You were the programme director of the branch support
programme?
A. Correct.
Q. You were involved in preparing reports in response to
Second Sight?
A. Correct.
Q. You were involved in decisions about what information
was provided to Second Sight?
A. Correct.
Q. And at paragraph 9 of your witness statement on
{E2/5/3}, you say:
"At paragraph 2.4, Mr Henderson says that he
analysed some transaction data provided to him. I do
not know what transaction data he is referring to or
what he means by him being able to 'reverse engineer'
this data."
Now, paragraph 2.4 says that he was provided the
information by Mr Jenkins, Gareth Jenkins, in his
witness statement?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. You know who Mr Gareth Jenkins is, don't you?
A. I know who he is, yes.
Q. Have you ever met him?
A. No.
Q. Because there are quite a lot of references in the
Fujitsu witnesses' witness statements in particular to
Mr Jenkins, aren't there?
A. Yes, that's correct.
Q. And particularly in Mr Godeseth's witness statement?
A. Yes, I understand.
Q. And you in turn refer to Mr Godeseth's witness statement
in your witness statement?
A. I do.
Q. Did you make any requests for clarity from Mr Jenkins
about what that transaction data was if it was provided
by Fujitsu?
A. No, I didn't.
Q. Because presumably Post Office would have had to agree
for Fujitsu to provide it if it was to Second Sight?
A. So I wasn't involved in all of that as part of the
programme. I was aware that Mr Henderson had met with
Gareth Jenkins, but I wasn't fully aware of all the
detail of that at the time.
Q. Okay. Let's move on to transactions outside working
hours. That's on {E2/5/3}, paragraph 12 of your witness
statement and you would agree on the face of it, if
Mr Henderson was concerned about transactions outside
working hours that that's a reasonable thing for him to
be at least interested and curious about, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. On the face of it?
A. Yes.
Q. And paragraph 13 of your witness statement gives what
you explain are a number of plausible and legitimate
explanations which you set out below, do you see that?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. First line. {E2/5/4} and you say:
"For the sake of clarity, I categorically confirm
that I am not aware of any improper conduct by
Post Office or Fujitsu like this, or of any reason why
Post Office or Fujitsu would engage in such conduct.
I am informed by Post Office's solicitors that in the
course of investigating this matter ..."
So that's for this trial, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. "... Fujitsu have advised that 'phantom sales' were
reported in around 2000 which appeared to be caused by
hardware issues."
Now, pausing there, were you aware prior to being
told that in relation to these proceedings that there
had been phantom sales problems on the Horizon system?
A. Not that I can recall.
Q. So if a postmaster had said that to you at the time,
prior to this litigation, you would have assumed it was
actually more likely to be user error, is that fair?
A. I would have and then an issue would have been raised
and would have been investigated from the Horizon logs
to see what was there.
Q. And it is fair that you explain you have had quite a lot
of experience looking into discrepancies with
subpostmasters?
A. I have.
Q. So it's against the background of that experience that
you nonetheless weren't aware of even the existence of
a problem with phantom sales having happened?
A. Yes, that's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Can you just give me an approximate
either month or year when you became aware of phantom
sales?
A. I don't recall, my Lord, the approximate year.
I mean -- so when I got involved with the mediation
scheme that's probably when we started to hear claims of
phantom transactions and that's -- when we investigated
some of those claims and we could see no evidence of
that throughout that, so that would have been a few
years back. I can't remember exactly when.
Q. Just to make sure I correctly heard your answer, you
investigated and you could see no evidence of that?
A. So I can't remember exactly -- so when we were doing the
mediation scheme then we had people saying to us they
were phantom sales. Some of the mediation ones that
I looked into is, as I set out in here, when we have
looked into that it was transactions being done after
the system had automatically logged somebody off, so if
they had been dormant for 59 minutes it would actually
complete what was in the basket and produce the receipt
and one of the instances I can remember was that was
after they had closed the branch and that they thought
that was a phantom transaction and we could explain that
from the evidence on the transaction logs to how that
happened.
Q. Just going back, just looking at paragraph 13 again,
four lines down on the right-hand side:
"I am informed by Post Office's solicitors that in
the course of investigating this matter, Fujitsu have
advised that 'phantom sales' were reported in around
2000 ..."
So that information appears to have come to you for
the first time from Post Office's solicitors, is that
right?
A. Yes, I wasn't aware that we had had phantom sales in
2000. I wasn't aware of that.
Q. So up until that point you would have assumed it was
user error?
A. Yes, I would have.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at the phrase that
you have used, "plausible and legitimate explanations".
If you focus on paragraph 13 for a second, you see that
after the bit about phantom sales having been reported
"which appeared to be caused by hardware issues" it
says:
"This is dealt with in the witness statement of
Fujitsu's Steve Parker, but I understand the key point
to be that such matters, provided they relate to stock
sales, should not cause a discrepancy in a branch's
accounts."
Now, pausing there, are you saying that a phantom
stock sale is a plausible and legitimate explanation for
a phantom transaction? What are you saying exactly
there?
A. So if stock -- so say stamps had been put into the
basket and it wasn't by the user, then that's what I'm
referring to in terms of a phantom sale, so it would be
put in as if it was being sold and hadn't been sold.
Q. But what if the stamps were self-declaring without input
from the user? That's a bit of a problem, isn't it, if
you're the subpostmaster?
A. Yes.
Q. If a ridiculous value of stamps was self-declaring, it's
not the stock you've got, that's a big problem for the
subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. It would be in that -- putting into the stack, yes.
Q. Okay. Let's have a look if we may at the phantom sales
master PEAK. Now, you know what a master PEAK is, don't
you?
A. The main one.
Q. It is the main -- where there are a number of iterations
of a problem what Fujitsu do is they pull together
a number of PEAKs into a master PEAK to collect the
cases of different people who have had the same problem?
A. Yes.
Q. And let's look please at {F/97}. This is the master
PEAK for phantom sales, PEAK number 0065021, dated
17 April 2001. That's when it is actually initiated in
the main box and the target date in the PEAK you will
see is the 13 June 2001, do you see that?
A. I do.
Q. Have you seen this PEAK before?
A. Not that I recall.
Q. So --
A. I certainly didn't see this back in 2001.
Q. So there are a number of different FAD codes for
different SPMs in this PEAK, but can we just look -- is
there any way we could slightly increase the size of the
text?
A. Thank you.
Q. Mrs van den Bogerd, can you see that all right?
A. I can, yes.
Q. That's perfect, thank you very much.
So if we just look at 14/04/01 at the top there, do
you see:
"New complaint call as previous ... closed WITHOUT
permission from PM."
Do you see that?
A. I see that.
Q. And the reason that "WITHOUT" is in capitals is because
the call shouldn't be closed without the agreement of
the subpostmaster; that's right, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the next one done:
"PM wishing to complaint about ongoing system
problems, see call 0104 [et cetera] ... for details."
Then:
"PM had previous complaint open ... that PM was
under impression (correctly) that it could only be
closed with his permission. It would appear Ki Barnes
gave authorisation to close that call. PM VERY unhappy
about this."
Do you see that?
A. I do.
Q. Then the next one down, 12.58:
"Information: PM extremely unhappy about the
problems with his counters. He says he has had to pay
out over £1,500 in losses that are due to these
problems. He has informed POCL ..."
Post Office Counters Limited, which was then the
name of the Post Office, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "He has informed POCL they can suspend him because he is
refusing to make good any further losses."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "PM wants a face-to-face meeting with someone in
authority from Pathway/POCL to discuss the issues.
PM feels very strongly about this and says he is willing
to take POCL to a tribunal/court because of the stress
he has suffered because of the problems."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Then halfway down the page you can see "JULIAN HALL", in
capitals, and:
"Information: THIS CALL IS ONLY TO BE CLOSED WITH
THE EXPRESS PERMISSION OF JULIAN HALL."
Who is this particular subpostmaster who seems to be
one of the main complaints in this PEAK, yes? And
that's the correct procedure, it shouldn't be closed
without his position, yes?
A. That is the correct procedure, yes.
Q. Then 14/04/01:
"PM has lost all confidence in system and Ki Barnes
as he feels she has misled him over previous calls."
Then underneath that:
"The system seems to lose transaction and PM is
concerned that for every transaction error he notices
there is the probability that there are ones he misses,
leading to discrepancies. The PM is at present finding
the whole scenario very stressful and is suffering
sleepness nights due to these problems. In the light of
what has gone on the PM is prepared to break his
contractual obligations with POCL and refuse to pay any
more discrepancies and will take legal action if
required."
So it is clear, isn't it, here that before we get
into the detail about what the root cause is, which we
will come to in a moment, the PM has had a call closed
wrongly that should not have been closed.
A. Yes.
Q. Is extremely distressed about it, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And there are significant sums of money involved?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that fair? And you can understand why it's a fair
complaint to make about Ki Barnes that she has
authorised the closure of a complaint that should not
have been closed; that's fair?
A. That is fair.
Q. Right, let's look at what we find under 17/04/01 at
9.48:
"Contacted: I have left a message on Ki Barnes
voicemail as the PM is now complaining about her. I was
speaking to her about the last complaint call and we
both feel that this PM is complaining unjustly. She has
been in contact with him and I feel he is complaining
because the feedback has been advising it is user error,
whereas the PM thinks it is software."
Now, pausing there, let's leave to one side for
a moment the PM supposedly complaining unjustly, it is
clear from this that the feedback the subpostmaster is
getting is that this is user error, yes?
A. From -- yes, yes.
Q. And the PM thinks it is software?
A. Yes.
Q. So this is a good example of the competition which you
have referred to in your witness statement --
A. Yes.
Q. -- of the subpostmaster saying it is software and
effectively what appears to be the feedback he is
getting that it is user error?
A. Yes.
Q. The fact that the feedback says it is user error, do you
think that might have contributed to the closing of the
call by Ki Barnes, or is that not in your experience?
You may not be able to answer.
A. No, it would depend on whether other investigations had
taken place.
Q. Okay. Let's have a look. If we go down to the bottom
of this page, 10.17:
"As I was on the phone to the PM, he advised that
three first class stamps that were on the screen just
'dropped off'. PM had three first class stamps ..."
A. Sorry, I have lost that.
Q. I'm so sorry, it is just at the bottom there. Just
under "Contacted".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Hold on one second. We have just jumped
down to the second part but it is the same page.
I shared your slight concern we had gone somewhere else.
Can you now see the entry?
A. I can see that now, thank you.
MR GREEN: So you see "Contacted" there.
A. Yes.
Q. "As I was on the phone to the PM, he advised that three
first class stamps that were on the screen just 'dropped
off'."
That's while he is actually on the phone he is
reporting something that appears to happen either during
the telephone call or had just happened:
"PM had 3 first class stamps and other stamps for
30p. When the other stamps 30, went on, the first class
stamps disappeared. They have since put the 3 first
class stamps again. The first transaction (that
disappeared) was put on as 2 first class stamps and
1 normal first class stamp."
And the transaction IDs follow. So he is clearly
having a problem with the stamps.
If we go on to the next page of this PEAK {F/97/2}
you will see there:
"PM advises that the transactions taken after this
one ... which basically skips out transaction
[number 77]. We were unable to find out the transaction
ref of the 1 first class stamp that was taken with the
2 ... can SSC please investigate why he has had
disappearing transactions again and perhaps
a recommendation as to what action can be taken."
Now, there is quite a lot of content in this and I'm
just going to take you to a couple of points if I may.
Let's go forward to page 4 of this PEAK please {F/97/4}
and about halfway down, just more about two-thirds of
the way down, about an inch below the Dell on the side
of the screen can you see 01/05/01, 9.36?
A. Yes.
Q. This is actually a different FAD number. It says:
"PM wants to speak to someone face-to-face and is
fed up with things getting passed back and forth to and
from different departments and nothing ever happening.
PM is willing to travel if he has to in order to speak
to someone face-to-face."
So we have had Mr Hall wanting to speak to someone
face-to-face and we appear to have a different
subpostmaster wanting to speak face-to-face. You will
have encountered, won't you, in your experience when
these problems happen subpostmasters just eventually get
to a point where they get fed up with dealing with the
helpline and they just want to talk to someone
face-to-face to get it sorted out?
A. Yes.
Q. And that doesn't always happen, does it, when they want
to and some of them get quite frustrated?
A. And I can understand that frustration, yes.
Q. Let's look at page 5 please --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Just before you -- are you moving off
that one?
MR GREEN: I am.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: A little bit further down,
Mrs van den Bogerd, there's an entry -- I just wondered
if you understood what it is and if you don't, please
don't worry. There's an entry 1 May 2001 at 10.56, do
you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It says:
"Information: ROMEC are contacting the site to let
them know that they will be attending site ... to fit
suppressors and double sheet flyleads, in order to help
the enviromental fault."
Do you know what ROMEC do?
A. ROMEC were Royal Mail engineers --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Royal Mail engineers?
A. In-house electricians and engineers.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, thank you very much.
Mr Green.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I was just about to pick up --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's fine.
MR GREEN: If we look at page 5 of this PEAK {F/97/5}, if we
go down to the bottom do you see 3 May 2001?
A. Which time?
Q. 15.34.
A. Yes.
Q. So:
"ROMEC have been to site and have done all they can
do. There is no more UKSS2 can do for this site."
What is UK SS2?
A. I'm sorry, I don't know.
Q. Not sure. And then underneath that, 04/05:
"Information: Ki Barnes has called in. I am unsure
as to what to do with this call now. ROMEC [which is
Royal Mail engineers] have been to site and state that
they have actually seen the phantom transactions, so it
is not just the PM's word now. They have fitted
suppressers to the kit ..."
Which is the reference his Lordship took you to:
"... but the PM is still having problems. As yet
there has been no recurrence to the phantom transaction
but there still may be problems."
Now, pausing there, that is independent site visit
corroboration of the problem by Royal Mail's own
engineers at the branch, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. That's clearly not user error any more?
A. No.
Q. Let's look at page 7 {F/97/7}, and if we go down to
19 June 2001 at 3.17, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "I now have pressing evidence to suggest that unwanted
peripheral input is occurring, the likely source being
the screen.
"This has been seen at Old Isleworth ... and
Wawne ... with OI being the best site; when the PM has
been asked to leave the screen on overnight I have
observed system activity corresponding to screen presses
happening with no corresponding evidence of either
routine system activity or human interference ..."
So on the face of it there's unwanted peripheral
input occurring into the system?
A. Yes.
Q. Can we go to page 9 {F/97/9}, top of page 9,
7 August 2001 please, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Halfway across "Repeat call":
"PM Mr Julian Hall back online - has just been
speaking to Becky - insists that he would like this call
updating with this information. When the
transaction ... was entered the cheque for £75 did not
appear in the stack, but then turned up on the cheques
listing. This information was not mentioned when he
initially spoke to Becky and would like it including in
the call."
Yes? So he still seems to be having difficulties
and he is trying to make sure that he is giving full and
precise details of what's going on, isn't he?
A. Yes.
Q. And then if we look down at 24 September 2001 -- this is
just slightly outside the main stream of the items
I have been asking to you look at -- we can see this is
a different SPM. You can see there it says:
"PM called as her system said that it was printing
a report for 20 minutes and she wasn't even printing
a report. She tried to settle a transaction to cash and
that came on screen. Advised PM to reboot and told her
I would update the call. PM happy."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So there are some things which appear to be actual
phantom transactions and then there are other things
which are phantom events that we might find in the
events log?
A. Yes.
Q. Like printing a report, when she is there; it is not
printing a report for 20 minutes at all, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then there's a repeat call about a monitor and then
if we look at the bottom of the page, 12 November, this
is basically the conclusion to all this:
"Phantom transactions have not been proven in
circumstances which preclude user error. In all cases
where these have occurred a user error related cause can
be attributed to the phenomenon."
And over the page {F/97/10}, "No fault in product".
It doesn't suggest, does it, a great willingness to
acknowledge what appear to be independently observed
faults with aspects of the Horizon system, does it?
A. Not from this, no.
Q. Now, if we go please to {F/773}. This is PEAK 0208335
and if we just quickly look in the summary it will give
us -- this is February 2011:
"Branches will be forced to declare stock when they
don't want to. Apparent reappearance of withdrawn stock
may cause spurious discrepancies."
Do you see in the summary box across the middle?
A. Yes.
Q. "Avoidance action taken so far is only appropriate in
the short-term while very few branches are affected;
over the next few months it could be affecting around
10 branches per week. NBSC aware of problem."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Just if we go over the page please to {F/773/2}, if you
look at the top -- just go halfway across the line at
the top:
"The office went into the declaration and confirmed
it showed the PO saving stamps and other stock items,
some showing as minus stock amounts, that were not
correct to the branch."
So the problem with negative stock appearing in --
this is in 2011:
"It somehow seems that the system has somehow picked
up this declaration and this is the cause of the
discrepancies appearing on the system. The SPMR was
told to declare the correct stock figures but is
reluctant to do this as this will cause discrepancies
when she next balances that are not relevant to herself
at the moment."
So that's a matter that would concern any
subpostmaster, isn't it, because they are effectively
having to declare something that they don't agree with?
A. Yes.
Q. And enter into the account on the Horizon system
effectively an account which accepts a discrepancy that
they completely disagree with?
A. From reading that, yes.
Q. Yes. So had you seen this PEAK before?
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Before today, or before your witness
statement?
A. No, I don't recall seeing this at all.
MR GREEN: So is it right that if you had heard that story
from a postmaster in any of the many conversations you
have had about difficulties they faced, you would have
assumed it was user error, wouldn't you?
A. Without -- yes, so without them ... with the situation
being referred to the Horizon service desk and Fujitsu
looking at it, without that happening then yes I would
have, if there was nothing to support ... but what
I would have done is looked at what's happened in branch
to determine whether there was a plausible explanation
in branch and if not if there's anything -- I mean this
is quite specific around -- I have seen this happen at
this time, I've got the reference -- the number of the
session ID, so this is quite specific.
Q. In a sense this subpostmaster was quite lucky that what
was being thrown up was stock that wasn't in use any
more because it's a lot easier for them to say "Well,
hold on a second, I don't even have that --"
A. Yes.
Q. -- "that item shouldn't even be there". So that's
really luck that that was the problem for this
subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. In that it was obvious, yes.
Q. Much easier for them?
A. Yes.
Q. But if what's thrown up is a stamps discrepancy for
first class stamps that they do stock, it's much harder
for the subpostmaster?
A. Yes, it would be.
Q. Yes. And what we see there is that whilst the previous
PEAK appears to be a hardware problem of phantom
transactions, this one appears more like a software
problem, does not it?
A. From this, yes, it does.
Q. And we can see at page 7 of this PEAK {F/773/7}, we can
see that this is closed on 10 September, final
"Administrative response" is the category for that PEAK.
It doesn't really give a hint of the trouble that's been
caused, does it, that category?
A. No.
Q. Mr Parker very fairly accepts in his witness statement
that the categories assigned were somewhat subjective.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. And were not ever actually audited to ensure
consistency.
A. Yes.
Q. I think that's a pretty shining example of that,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can we go now to {F/1286.2/2}. This is
a 9 December email and it is from the NBSC admin team to
the branch support team. Now, in 2014 you were head of
the branch support team, weren't you?
A. Yes.
Q. And what we see there is:
"Branch reporting that he has found sensitive issue
with Horizon when the system put a phantom cheque on the
cheque line in July 2013. Claims to have evidence to
support his claim."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. That would be pretty interesting to see, wouldn't it,
the evidence, if someone claims to have it?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. "Although he himself did not suffer a loss, thinks that
Horizon is flawed. Did not ask to be contacted about
this. Just wanted to say that he had this information
and threatened to go to MP as a result."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can we go back to page 1 please and just follow
this through {F/1286.2/1}. This is sent up by
Nigel Allen to Andrew Winn, Andy as he is known, yes?
And you know Andrew Winn, don't you?
A. Yes.
Q. And you have worked with him?
A. Not for very long; not directly.
Q. Okay. And what we see there is in the middle of the
page, Nigel Allen is saying:
"Given the current media and in particular the BBC's
attention on Horizon, do you think it is worthwhile
looking into this 'alleged flaw' with Horizon that this
SPMR has highlighted to preempt any enquiries from his
MP?"
And what comes back is:
"Hi Nigel,
"There is nothing I can investigate given the level
of detail provided unless he only accepted one cheque
in July 13. Even then I don't have the level of detail
needed and would need Fujitsu support. Without
a date/value we can't really raise a request.
"I don't really understand what the purpose of the
call is. Does he want it investigated or not? My
instinct is that we have enough on with people asking us
to look at things.
"I can't figure out how if a phantom cheque appeared
on Horizon he could avoid a loss unless another phantom
transaction took it away again!!!!"
Yes? So let's just unpack that, if we may. The
first point is that information which might be relevant
if you had an interest in knowing the truth about the
reliability of Horizon has been offered --
A. Yes.
Q. -- by a subpostmaster who has rung up, and the
subpostmaster has said they've got evidence, as we saw,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if one had any interest whatsoever in knowing the
truth about the reliability of Horizon, you would say
"Well, can you please get him to send the evidence",
wouldn't you?
A. Yes, you would.
Q. And that's not what happened?
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you consider that that reaction from
Mr Winn is an adequate reaction --
A. No.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- or an inadequate reaction?
A. That's a totally inadequate reaction. The fact that we
had the details from the branch on there -- you know,
the name of the branch, the FAD code, it would have been
very easy for Mr Winn to have contacted to get further
information and I would have expected him to have done
so.
MR GREEN: There is one final point on this email, if I may,
just quickly. The last bit of Mr Winn's email where it
says:
"I can't figure out how if a phantom cheque appeared
on Horizon he could avoid a loss unless another phantom
transaction took it away again!!!!"
And the point about that is that shows, red in tooth
and claw, that if a phantom cheque comes up into your
account you're going to suffer a loss, aren't you?
That's what he's saying?
A. That's what he is saying there, yes.
Q. And that's right, isn't it?
A. Well, it depends -- you know, it would come in as
a payment for something, so if he has had -- I'm not
sure actually and this is why it would have needed to
have been investigated because if a phantom cheque came
in then it would come in as a method of payment.
Q. Well, if a phantom cheque -- if you're supposed to have
received money that you haven't actually had, you are
not going to have the money in your branch, are you?
You're going to be short of something if on the system
you are supposed to have had a payment for something and
you haven't actually received it?
A. He is saying he has had a phantom cheque appear on
Horizon.
Q. Yes.
A. So to me that means he's got a cheque there that -- oh,
I see, he's got a cheque there that he hasn't actually
got.
Q. Yes. Horizon is showing a cheque he hasn't actually
had?
A. I think that is the classic example of why that needed
to be investigated.
Q. Yes, because -- let's put it very neutrally -- at the
very lowest, on the face of it there's a risk that he
may have had a loss --
A. Yes, absolutely.
Q. -- in that type of situation; is that fair?
A. Absolutely. And even though he has said he didn't have
a loss it could have meant that he made an error
somewhere else and he could have had a loss after all.
Q. Quite. Yes.
So this doesn't seem to have been drawn to your
attention at all, as far as we can see?
A. I don't remember this at all.
Q. No. Were you aware of that sort of problem being
discussed?
A. No. I mean if I had become aware of that I would have
requested an investigation to be done on that,
absolutely.
Q. Because people have had quite a lot of problems with
cheques over the years, haven't they? Subpostmasters,
one of the things that --
A. Yes, there have been errors with cheques.
Q. Yes. Let's have a look, if we may please, at the next
topic in your witness statement, transactions not
associated with SPM user IDs, which we see on page 6 of
your witness statement {E2/5/6}. If we go to
paragraph 18 {E2/5/6} and this is you responding to
Mr Henderson's suggestion that there may be transactions
associated with the user ID that the subpostmaster
didn't conduct.
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Leaving aside for a moment the husband or wife who have
moved over while the other one has logged on and used
the log in or something like that, just leave that aside
for a minute, but one possibility is that an auditor has
accepted a TC on behalf of a subpostmaster, isn't it?
A. An auditor whilst in branch?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes, that is a possibility.
Q. Yes, because if we look at {F/499}, this note is
actually in Mr Abdulla's case:
"Call from auditor on 08.04.09 - postmaster not
present at audit so this TC was accepted and settled
centrally by auditor."
A. Okay.
Q. Is it your understanding that that's how things should
proceed in the absence of a subpostmaster at a branch?
A. Not normally. If a postmaster isn't available when
there's an audit then it is usually whoever they have
left in charge that we would ask to process anything
that would need to be processed on the day.
Q. Okay. Let's look at paragraph 18.4 {E2/5/6} where you
go on to deal with what you describe as a:
"... further very rare scenario in relation to
Legacy Horizon only, involving the insertion of
a transaction at the counter by the SSC."
A. Yes.
Q. "In this instance Horizon would associate the
transaction with the user ID of the individual logged on
at that counter. If nobody was logged on at the time
the transaction was inserted then the user ID would be
missing. These transactions would be clearly
identifiable in the audit trail as having been inserted
by SSC."
Now, taking it in stages, in the records where the
log in ID was shown, if the subpostmaster is logged on
at the time, the subpostmaster's own ID would show,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And you made this witness statement in November 2018.
This was something that you were aware of when you made
this witness statement, isn't it --
A. Yes.
Q. -- the possibility of inserting transactions?
A. The possibility but I've never actually seen this
happen. The possibility of it, yes.
Q. How long have you known about that possibility?
A. This is something I have not -- because I have not
experienced it myself, I have not known of it that long
actually.
Q. Could you give the court a rough idea of how long you
have known it was possible?
A. In terms of inserting transactions, last year or so.
Q. Who told you about it?
A. Anything to do technically with Horizon I would get the
information from Fujitsu.
Q. And was it Gareth Jenkins or was it someone else, can
you remember?
A. I have not got this directly from Gareth Jenkins.
Q. Do you know if it originally came from him?
A. It probably did.
Q. Probably from Gareth. When you say it would be visible
in the audit trail at the end of 18.4 {E2/5/7}, what are
you referring to as the audit trail?
A. So on the transaction log in branch.
Q. You say it would be visible on the transaction log --
A. In the branch.
Q. -- in the branch?
A. It would be visible to the branch that somebody other
than that user had done a transaction. That's my
understanding of how that works.
Q. Do you -- or do you in fact mean -- if you don't
actually know and you are having to sort of slightly do
your best for the court --
A. Yes.
Q. -- that's not a fair thing for you to be asked to do,
because you are on oath.
A. I've never see --
Q. Perfectly okay to say you're not sure.
A. I've never seen this so I can't speak on it from a
working knowledge of actually seeing it.
Q. And you don't actually know whether it would be on the
transaction log or actually in the audit store data in
the audit, do you?
A. So my understanding was it would be in branch that it
would be visible, but as I say I've never seen it so
I couldn't actually ...
Q. Okay.
My Lord, would that be a convenient moment for
a break?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, it would.
Mrs van den Bogerd, you will recall this from last
time but you are now in the middle of your evidence so
you are not to talk to anyone about the case. We are
going to have a short break for the shorthand writers.
We will come back in at 5 to.
(11.45 am)
(Short Break)
(11.55 am)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, can I just ask you to have
a quick look at page 45 of the transcript just before
the break.
We see at line 7 I said:
"Question: And you know Andrew Winn, don't you?
"Answer: Yes.
"Question: And you have worked with him?
"Answer: Not for very long; not directly."
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Just to clarify, could we look please at {F/1114}. This
is 7 August 2013.
A. Yes.
Q. This is the branch support programme terms of reference
and this was the programme that you were in charge of,
wasn't it?
A. That's correct.
Q. And at this stage Post Office had decided to try to
address the concerns raised by some postmasters over
recent years and at this stage Post Office commissioned
the independent review and so forth and we see the scope
there, first bullet point is:
"Post Office's attitude to subpostmasters which is
often defensive and unsympathetic, with a focus to
recover assets rather than to identify the root cause of
the problem."
A. Yes.
Q. This is what the interim report had identified,
isn't it, as we see in the introduction to those bullet
points?
A. Yes.
Q. And then the third one, for example:
"Lack of timely, accurate and complete information
provided to subpostmasters to support them in resolving
issues."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then the approach is then explained and if we could
go over the page please {F/1114/2} you will see there
the governance and key stakeholders are then set out and
Alice Perkins -- who was Alice Perkins?
A. She was the chairman at the time.
Q. She was the chairman. And Paula Vennells was the CEO
until very recently?
A. Yes.
Q. And they have requested the establishment of the
programme, which will be led by you?
A. That's right.
Q. With Gayle Peacock accountable for running it on an
operational level?
A. That's correct.
Q. Then if we look down to the underneath table in terms of
finance, on the programme board was Mr Ismay and then
working group level, Mr Winn, Alison Bolsover and
Paul Lebeter?
A. That's correct.
Q. That was the context, was it, in which you worked with
Mr Winn on these issues?
A. Yes. When we set up the mediation scheme as well,
a number of the queries -- when we were investigating
some of the issues then Andy Winn had been involved in
some of them previously and had worked with Second Sight
on some of the spot reviews as well, so I did -- that
was the first time I had come across Andy Winn, and
he -- FSD at the time was run by Rod Ismay and he was
part of that team.
Q. And his responsibility and the reason why he was
included in that group is in the right-hand column,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. The right-hand column is headed "Reason for inclusion
within the group".
A. Absolutely, yes.
Q. And if we look at the right-hand corner it says:
"Responsible for branch accounting and client
settlement. Also responsible for resolving specific
branch accounting issues."
A. Yes.
Q. So in terms of that, that was sort of front and centre
of what he was properly supposed to be dealing with,
isn't it?
A. The second part of that, yes, the issues. Not the
branch account and client settlement.
Q. Okay, so Mr Winn was responsible for the specific branch
accounting issues?
A. Yes, he did the dispute resolution, yes.
Q. So in context, he was the right person for that email we
looked at before the break to have gone to, wasn't he?
A. Yes, he was.
Q. That doesn't improve the unsatisfactory response,
does it?
A. Sorry, doesn't improve?
Q. Well, the fact that he is the very person who is
supposed to be dealing with it doesn't make it any
better, it makes it look worse?
A. No, it makes it worse actually, yes.
Q. Okay. Can we now look at lottery transactions, which
you deal with at paragraph 23 and following in your
statement at {E2/5/8}.
Now, you refer to the introduction of PING in 2012,
paragraph 25.
A. Yes.
Q. So you then explain how the system worked before the
introduction of PING and after the introduction of PING.
A. Yes.
Q. Before PING, 26.1 {E2/5/8}, SPMs had to activate
scratchcards on the lottery terminal and rem them in on
the Horizon terminal completely separately?
A. Yes.
Q. So if there was any difference between the two
activities that would create a problem or a discrepancy
of some sort?
A. Yes, it would.
Q. And at the end of 26.3 you say:
"There are many explanations as to why the two
figures do not match, the simplest of which is that the
branch had (i) activated a pack without remitting it
into Horizon or (ii) remitted a pack into Horizon
without activating it."
A. Yes.
Q. Now, if an SPM activated on a lottery terminal but
didn't rem it in on the Horizon terminal, if
reconciliation worked correctly there should ultimately
be a transaction correction sent to the Horizon
terminal, is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. And that in itself depends on the reconciliation process
working correctly, doesn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And that in turn depends on the integrity of the client
data being provided by Camelot?
A. Yes.
Q. And the process for determining whether a TC should be
issued within Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. And at 26.4 you say:
"By around 2010, the level of TCs from lottery
scratchcards had begun to grow. A practice had
developed in some branches whereby they would activate
the scratchcards but wait for the transaction correction
a few days/weeks later rather than actively remitting in
each pack on Horizon. They did this because it saved
them a little bit of time, but it caused their accounts
to become confused (because they would be selling
scratchcards without first having recorded the inbound
scratchcard stock)."
Now, pausing there, you are suggesting there that
that was a sort of conscious decision, yes? But it
could have been through a lack of understanding, or
a simple mistake, couldn't it?
A. Yes, it could have.
Q. And there were, as we have seen -- we saw in the common
issues trial there was a problem with very large lottery
TCs arriving weeks later.
A. Yes.
Q. Some of which were in error.
A. Yes.
Q. Some credits, some debits.
A. Yes.
Q. Both unsatisfactory?
A. Um ...
Q. When they are in error?
A. Oh, I see: yes.
Q. So that was why the policy we looked at during the
common issues trial was introduced, to try and cater for
that, not do them immediately before the end of
a trading period?
A. Yes.
Q. Amongst other things. And SPMs effectively became used
to quite a lot of lottery TCs coming in, didn't they?
A. From the numbers that we were processing, yes, I would
say that would be fair.
Q. And what about if a subpostmaster remmed in on the
Horizon terminal but didn't activate on the lottery
terminal, what would happen then? You would get a TC as
well?
A. Yes.
Q. And what changed when PING was introduced, which is
paragraph 26.7, is that lottery scratchcards were
actually activated on the lottery terminal and there was
no need to rem them in on the Horizon terminal any more?
A. It was an automatic, so the TA would come.
Q. So the information would go from the Horizon terminal
back to Camelot and be sent to Post Office?
A. No, it would go from the Camelot terminal.
Q. Sorry?
A. The Camelot terminal. It would go -- so the activated
pack would go to Camelot and then come into Post Office
and then it would come back to us.
Q. Exactly, yes.
A. Yes.
Q. So the SPM activates the pack on the lottery terminal?
A. Yes.
Q. That tells Camelot it has been activated?
A. Why he.
Q. Camelot tell Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. And Post Office send an automatic TA?
A. That's right.
Q. And that's generated automatically?
A. Yes.
Q. To avoid manual reconciliation difficulties?
A. Yes.
Q. And provided that the data coming back from Camelot is
correct and there are no problems in the data
transmission from the lottery terminal, that should be
correct?
A. Yes.
Q. And overall it was an improvement for SPMs?
A. Yes.
Q. And simplified the process?
A. Absolutely.
Q. And PING was not limited to scratchcards, it also
applied to lottery online sales as well?
A. Yes.
Q. It did take quite a long time to implement, didn't it?
A. I can't remember exactly how long from when it was first
suggested.
Q. Well, I mean lottery had been in branches since before
the introduction of Horizon?
A. Yes.
Q. So before 1999/2000.
A. I can't remember exactly when, but ...
Q. For example, Mr Bates, you might remember, was actually
required to have a lottery terminal in a prominent
position in his branch and then built it up and then
Post Office told him he couldn't have it any more?
A. What I'm saying is I can't remember when we actually
started Camelot business.
Q. I understand. Have a look if we may at {F/506}. And if
we look at page 3 {F/506/3} we can see on the version
control, the document history, at 2.2, the initial
version of this document is 2008, isn't it?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you looking at?
MR GREEN: 2.2, my Lord, "Document history", 0.1.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes.
MR GREEN: 10 October 2008. And if we look at page 9
{F/506/9}, we have the context of that document. The
background is:
"In line with the commercial contracts with clients,
a number of settlements made by product and branch
accounting are based upon data provided by the client.
Such an example is Camelot, where settlement is based
upon data captured by the Camelot terminal in outlets
rather than the data being captured at transactional
source by [Horizon]."
HNG-X, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it then explains:
"The client data is uploaded into POL FS,
[Post Office Limited Financial System] and compared with
the equivalent [Horizon] data which has to be manually
input ..."
That's into the old system:
"... by the agent/counter clerk. Ideally the data,
when compared, should be the same but a number of
conformance issues have been identified where
agents/counter clerks do not perform end of day routines
correctly ..."
And so forth:
"This difference may require the issuing of
a transaction correction."
That's what we have just covered. Then if you go
down to the paragraph that begins "Although", do you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. "Although client based settlements are not a preferred
settlement option it is recognised that the data being
provided by clients such as Camelot is robust,
controlled by reference data, and more accurate than the
[Horizon] data stream due to the conformance issues
mentioned previously."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So this was a big vote of confidence in the accuracy, or
in fact robustness as it is termed there, of the Camelot
client data stream?
A. Yes.
Q. "The solution is to automate a process that converts the
client data file (eg Camelot) into a data feed into the
branch ... the branch will then accept the data and thus
avoid the issues described above."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So the whole point of this is that it is robust data
from Camelot, with automatic TAs that are issued which
then come into the subpostmaster's account effectively
the next day, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And they automatically have to accept those?
A. Yes.
Q. And you then explain this isn't in fact implemented
until 2012, if we look at paragraph 25 of your witness
statement please {E2/5/8}. Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we look please at {F/1539}, on page 5 -- you probably
noticed on the first page it is authored by
Gareth Jenkins.
A. Yes, I saw that.
Q. And at 2.5 it says:
"It would appear that PING has gone live for Camelot
(at last)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And this was an internal recognition that it had taken
rather a long time, hadn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. This document is dated 9 August 2016.
A. (Nods).
Q. And it is clear -- if we look at {F/506/11}, just to
confirm I think what you have accepted, this is the PING
project interfacing client data into POL's systems
document. We can see that there is no provision there
at all for anything other than acceptance, yes?
A. Of the --
Q. Of the TA?
A. -- transaction, correct. Acceptance, right, okay, yes.
Q. The transaction acknowledgement as opposed to
transaction correction?
A. Yes.
Q. So if you look at number 3 it says:
"The branch will be presented with the value to
'accept' only ... no opportunity to write off or ask for
evidence due to the inherent robustness of the Camelot
data provided."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that was how it was intended to work and we will have
a closer look at that with some of the specific examples
with individuals at the minute, but that's the
background.
Let's look at Mr Latif's situation. If we look at
paragraph 98 of your witness statement please on page 24
{E2/5/24}. Now, in that paragraph the explanation you
have given there is essentially that there was a data
entry error by Post Office?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, can you see that clearly in paragraph 98?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is prefaced with the words:
"To be clear, this was a data entry error by
Post Office and not an issue with Horizon."
A. Yes.
Q. Now, the point about that sentence is that sentence
tells the court that there's no problem with Horizon at
all, it's just someone manually entering the wrong
figure at Post Office, doesn't it? That's what that is
saying?
A. It says it is by Post Office, yes.
Q. So it's suggesting it is a manual error and not a system
problem?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. But we have just established from looking at the
documents, and you have agreed, that this process was
completely automated, wasn't it?
A. Automated, yes.
Q. So what you have said there cannot possibly be right,
can it?
A. No, from that, yes, it's --
Q. It's wrong?
A. The TA is automated. The TC is manually uploaded into
the system. Yes.
Q. Yes. So would it be fair to correct that part of your
statement --
A. It would be actually, yes.
Q. -- to say "To be clear, this is an issue with Horizon
and not a data entry error by Post Office"; is that
a fair correction to make?
A. I have made a mistake in that the way I have worded
that, absolutely, yes. So, yes, it is fair.
Q. Would you agree with the formulation I have given, or
would you prefer something slightly different? What
would you want the court to note as your evidence?
A. So the automated -- my understanding is the
transaction -- the TA is the information that comes from
Camelot to us and then it is passed through into
Horizon, so in that respect Horizon just conveys it, is
my understanding, and the information that's come from
Camelot in that respect would be incorrect.
Q. So the point is that either way, it is not a manual data
entry by Post Office?
A. No, it's not.
Q. Whatever it is, it's definitely not that, you agree with
that?
A. Yes, absolutely not. Agree, yes.
Q. What it could be is some problem with the information
somewhere between the terminal in the branch --
A. The lottery terminal, yes.
Q. The lottery terminal in the branch and the matters
showing up on the face of the Horizon terminal in the
branch?
A. Yes, I agree that.
Q. Somewhere there?
A. Yes.
Q. So it's definitely not a user error, is it?
A. No, that's not user error.
Q. Right. And on the face of it, it at least suggests some
doubt as to the robustness and integrity of the Camelot
data coming through in that automated system, doesn't
it?
A. I would say yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is it also the case that the branch
could have challenged the TA? Because I understood the
previous document to say they couldn't.
A. So they have to accept the T on the system, but if they
see something wrong on there they can actually get in
touch with FSC.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: On the helpline?
A. Or direct to FSC, because you can go to the helpline --
you can always go through the helpline NBSC into the
finance service centre anyway.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So looking at your final sentence of
paragraph 98 ...
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I understood the previous document to
say that the TA had to be accepted by the branch?
A. It does have to be accepted --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: It does have to be?
A. On the system, yes.
MR GREEN: And that's just a straight acceptance, isn't it?
A. That's my understanding of that, yes. If I recall
correctly, on the screen that comes through it does say
to make sure it is right and if not then you would get
in touch with FSC. I don't know the exact wording but
that's my recollection, on the TA.
Q. You are aware that some people had problems with TAs
quite a few times?
A. Yes, from looking at the transaction corrections.
Q. Some people had duplicate TAs, some people had all sorts
of problems with the TAs coming through, yes?
A. I would also say it is fair that most branches would
just accept it anyway.
Q. They would just accept it anyway some of them?
A. Because they -- you know, on the understanding that it
is an automatic pull-through from what they have
activated, I would -- my working assumption is most
people just hit the button and accept it.
Q. Well, you have to accept it, don't you?
A. Yes, but what I'm saying is they would do it --
Q. And you wouldn't do anything more --
A. -- yes, without even really looking at it.
Q. I mean in fact we can see that in -- slightly ahead,
I was going to take you to some of the documents that
show that that was actually internally anticipated by
Post Office, that what was anticipated was there would
be a basket and people would generally just hit "enter"
to accept all?
A. Yes.
Q. That's what was anticipated, wasn't it, and I think you
very fairly volunteered that just now?
A. Yes.
Q. Let's just have a little look at the helpline log please
at {F/1223/1}. It is 12 June 2014. I think that is
a native file so we just need to download that and it
will come up in a second. If we look on I think the
"Individual incidents" tab and then if we go to row
431 -- if we perhaps just type 431 in the top left-hand
box.
At row 431 you can see there National Lottery in
column H, transaction corrections is column I. If you
scroll to the right slightly please, "Lottery TA issue",
"PM says has still got a discrepancy due to the TA
problem."
Yes?
A. Yes, I see that.
Q. If we go down to row 2375 and you see "TC for
National Lottery", you can see in column L:
"TC not received for the TA that was duplicated from
last Saturday for National Lottery. Printed off TC
report and on there as processed."
So there's an issue there and if we just look at
3176:
"Lottery TAs: PM still not received TC for the TA
problem."
These are helpline call logs for the week of -- we
just looked at entries for 9 June, 10 June and 11 June.
These are the sort of problems that you fairly accepted
people had from time to time?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at the document at -- well, I might be
able to take it more quickly. There were also problems
that people were receiving TCs when they didn't know
what it was for in relation to National Lottery. That
was internally acknowledged, we saw it in the common
issues trial?
A. Yes, the lack of explanation on the TC.
Q. Yes. And then people were raising queries about errors
relating to the downloaded duplicate TA files in June.
A. Yes.
Q. 2014. Do you remember that?
So there was a problem with duplicate TAs, wasn't
there, from time to time?
A. From time to time, yes.
Q. Let's look please at {F/965/22}. TAs were later
introduced for Post and Go and Paystation transactions,
weren't they?
A. Yes.
Q. And if you look on page 22 there you will see:
"Crowns have incurred discrepancies as a result of
missing TAs ..."
Do you see the second box down, "Post and Go TA
missing or duplicated"?
A. Yes.
Q. This is under "Current issues". This is an integral
fraud and conformance report.
A. Okay.
Q. So that's Crown offices, that's not SPMs, is it?
A. No, that's directly ...
Q. Yes, so they were experiencing them too?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look back -- let's look at {F/1228} please and
what we're going to here is a branch user forum record
of input from users of Horizon and once we have loaded
it we're going to look at line 74. If we can go down to
line 74 and you can see there -- go slightly to the
right so we can get the whole ...
"Lottery and Paystation: why can't I sell lottery on
Horizon as other retailers do and similarly why is not
the Paystation functionality contained on Horizon -
saves messing around with separate tills or pots of cash
with TAs the following day or even later."
And so forth. And he makes the point about the
costs being borne by the subpostmasters at the bottom.
Just pausing there, the lottery terminal and
Paystation were not within the original design of the
Horizon system, were they?
A. No, they weren't.
Q. Even though lottery, for example, was in use prior to
the introduction of Horizon?
A. Yes, but it has always been Camelot's.
Q. So they were added on and that introduced the pre-PING
issue of mistakes between the terminals?
A. Yes.
Q. And then questions about whether it is user error or
something else that's gone wrong, there's an opacity
there, and post PING it introduced the issue of
duplicate TAs and difficulties with the integrity of the
data stream all the way through?
A. Yes.
Can I just say, when -- so when we brought in
Horizon very early on, the format of a post office was
very much that the post office was behind a counter,
screened counter, and the lottery terminal was always
designed to be on the retail counter and the Paystation
was -- it was more of an out of hours, so it was never
built as one, it was literally a very different part of
the post office itself and the retail, so it was very
different.
Q. It's a fair observation, but equally I think you would
accept it is a fair observation to remind oneself that
one of the conditions of appointment that Mr Bates had
to agree to, from Post Office, was that he would operate
a Horizon terminal from which Post Office would
profit -- not in his shop for him to profit from it, but
on behalf of Post Office --
A. Yes.
Q. -- he would operate a Horizon terminal in his branch.
It was actually a contractual requirement for him, yes?
A. Run through Post Office, yes.
Q. So that --
A. I'm just explaining why it wasn't part of the -- you
couldn't add it on to Horizon, it was very -- physically
very different, that was what I was saying. That was my
point I was making.
Q. He was required to have it in a prominent position at
his counter, wasn't he?
A. In some post offices it was. All I was explaining was
that in the vast majority it was physically apart from,
distanced from the main counter, which was behind
a screen. That was the only opponent I was making.
Q. I understand. Let's have a look at what you say about
failed reversals please. This is paragraph 154 of your
witness statement {E2/5/34}. Now, here you have moved
on to respond to go what Mr Coyne says. Do you see
that? It is on page 34.
A. Yes.
Q. E2/5/34, paragraph 154. It is under the heading just
above 153 "Mr Coyne's report", just to orientate you
where you are in your witness statement.
A. Yes.
Q. And you say:
"I address below a number of factual points raised
by Mr Coyne in his report."
Just pausing here. Mrs van den Bogerd, you
obviously took a lot of care over this witness
statement, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. That's fair?
A. Yes.
Q. And probably had even greater focus perhaps and greater
time to devote to this than someone dealing with an SPM
ringing up might have?
A. Sorry, what do you mean?
Q. You had more chance to look into all these things you
have dealt with, a greater opportunity to research and
look into these things, to provide this witness
statement?
A. In some areas, yes, I have, yes. Not in all because of
the way things were changing.
Q. But where you have been able to comment on a document
you have been able to consider it carefully and so
forth?
A. I have tried to, yes.
Q. And let's look at what you say about failed reversals.
You say:
"At paragraph 5.175 of his report, Mr Coyne has
referred to a report prepared by Helen Rose dated
12 June 2013 in the context of failed reversals. The
extracts taken from the report by Helen Rose referred to
by Mr Coyne are taken out of context and mistakenly
claim that the relevant reversal was issued in error by
Horizon not the subpostmaster. The Rose report makes it
clear that:
"The concerns were based on the fact that reversal
were not being shown on the particular data sets
reviewed/reports typically run by subpostmasters in
branch on Horizon;
"Transaction reversal data can be extracted from
Horizon ... the issue was therefore surrounding how the
transaction reversals were displayed/accessible in
branch and that there was no issue with Horizon itself."
Now, just pausing there, that is not something that
you have changed, is it?
A. No.
Q. Let's have a look please if we may at the underlying
document, the Helen Rose report itself, which is
{F/1082}. It is dated 12 June 2013. Can you see that?
A. Mm-hm, I can.
Q. Is this the document you looked at?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, if we look at page 2 of that document please
{F/1082/2}, it is obviously headed "Confidential and
legally privileged" and it is "Horizon data - Lepton",
the subpost office, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Executive summary:
"A transaction took place at Lepton
[subpost office] ... for a British Telecom bill payment
for £76.09; this was paid for by a Lloyds TSB cash
withdrawal for £80 and change a given for £3.91. At
10.37 on the same day the British Telecom bill payment
was reversed out to cash settlement."
Looks pretty suspicious, doesn't it, so far? Yes?
A. The running order of the times, do you mean?
Q. Does what we just read there look a bit suspicious?
A. Sorry, is this --
Q. Does it make it look as if it something strange has
happened?
A. Oh, right, yes.
Q. The bill payment has been reversed out for cash?
A. Yes.
Q. "The branch was issued with a transaction correction for
£76.09 which they duly settled ..."
So all that means is that they press "settle"
centrally, doesn't it? They can't dispute it -- we have
covered this lots of times. They can't dispute it on
Horizon, so all the postmaster can do is ring up and
deny --
A. I'm not sure that he actually settled in this one,
I think he made it good. I can't remember actually. In
terms of the way she is referring to language.
Q. Let's have a look.
A. Because it doesn't say settle centrally.
Q. Okay, maybe settled it in cash.
A. Yes, that's my understanding.
Q. One way or the other, what we then see is:
"The postmaster denied reversing this transaction
and involved a forensic accountant as he believed his
reputation was in doubt."
So he is having to instruct a forensic accountant to
help him over £76.09, is what we've got so far in the
story, isn't it?
A. As telling in the first review, yes.
Q. Let's look at reviewing the Credence data. Now, just
pausing there, we know, don't we, from Tracy Mather's
witness statement that the Credence data records the
actual key strokes that have been used?
A. Yes.
Q. So that's a really important source if you are in doubt
about what's actually been done by the postmaster, if
they say "I had help from the helpline and I did
a complicated set of key strokes", look at the Credence
data, that will tell you, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And so Helen Rose very sensibly looked at the Credence
data and said:
"... it clearly indicates that the reversal was
completed by JAR001 (postmaster) ..."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. At 10.37.
"... and was reversal indicator 1 (existing
refersal) and settled to cash. An existing reversal is
where the session number/automated payment number has to
be entered to reverse the item."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The Fujitsu logs were requested for this branch, but
whilst waiting for these to arrive communications took
place with Gareth Jenkins at Fujitsu for more details to
gain an understanding of what had occurred at this
branch."
And then we get questions and extracts in various
emails in response. It doesn't come up very clearly,
but black is the question and blue is the answer.
A. I can see that on here, yes.
Q. "Question - I am requesting Fujitsu logs for Lepton ...
to look at a reversal that the postmaster denies
transacting, do I need to request further details and
also could you explain what happens when the system
fails. (Gareth looked at data at his end prior to me
receiving the Fujitsu logs ...)
"Answer - this shows that session 537803 was
successfully saved to the [branch database] ..."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "... but when the user JAR001 ..."
Which we know is the subpostmaster:
"... logged on again recovery reversed the session
in session 537805."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So what the Credence data showed was it had been an
actual reversal by the subpostmaster, but in fact when
Mr Jenkins got into it he found it was actually a system
recovery that had reversed the session, didn't he?
A. Yes.
Q. And so he then goes on to say:
"It isn't clear what failed, but if it was a coms
error, then the system would have printed a disconnected
session receipt and the clerk should have given the
customer £80 and told him his bill was unpaid. The fact
that there is no indication of such a receipt in the
events table suggests the counter may have been rebooted
and so perhaps may have crashed in which case the clerk
may not have been told exactly what to do."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The reversal was due to recovery (Counter Mode Id =
118) so this was not an explicit reversal by the clerk.
This scenario is fairly rare so it is certainly quite
easy for the clerk to have made a mistake and either he
or the customer could be in pocket/out-of-pocket
(depending on exactly what happened!)."
Then this:
"The system is behaving as it should."
So there were issues, weren't there, where a problem
could arise for a subpostmaster by design of the system;
were you aware of that? There was a whole category of
PEAK codes for faults which are agreed between Fujitsu
and Post Office to just stay like that as part of the
design?
A. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You actually put two questions there.
MR GREEN: I'm sorry.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: On the second one you went on to codes,
so you really need to split them.
MR GREEN: That's entirely my fault. I'm sorry,
Mrs van den Bogerd.
Let's take it in stages. You can see there it says
"The system is behaving as it should"?
A. Yes.
Q. That would be problematic for a subpostmaster,
wouldn't it?
A. The way Gareth describes it here would be, yes, because
what he says is that it would have printed the session
receipt but it doesn't seem as if it did, when actually
disconnection transaction receipts were actually printed
in this example and a recovery receipt was printed. But
that's not referred to in here.
Q. Well, let's just have a look at that. Let me just ask
you my second question and then we will go on to probe
that with more care. The second point is are you aware
of a closure code for Fujitsu for PEAKs which refers to
faults which are known in the Horizon system but agreed
between Post Office and Fujitsu to stay there?
A. I'm not aware of a closure code.
Q. You didn't know about that?
A. No, I don't know about that.
Q. Okay.
Let's look at the question at the bottom of
{F/1082/2} which we are on. This is Helen Rose:
"I can clearly see the recovery reversal on the
Fujitsu logs received, but would this have been clear
had we not previously discussed this issue?"
That's her question. And the answer comes
{F/1082/3}:
"Note that the standard ARG spreadsheet may not make
it easy to confirm that the reversal was part of
recovery, but the underlying logs used to extract them
can show it."
A. Yes.
Q. So what Gareth Jenkins is pointing out to Helen Rose is
that the standard ARQ data would certainly not make it
clear but the underlying logs used to extract the ARQ
data can show it, has the capability of showing it, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then he then talks about the Excel spreadsheets of
what appear to be the underlying data and he says they
are part of the standard ARQ returned and it says:
"Rows 141 ..."
In the second line of that paragraph:
"Rows 141 to 143 of 4 to 25 October ... clearly show
a reversal. Also row 70 of [the events data] shows that
session 537803 ... has been recovered and this event has
the same time stamp as the reversal session. Also
row 71 ... shows that a receipt was generated from the
session ... (not explicitly, but it was the only session
at that time). This receipt would have told the user
that a roll back had taken place (but the logs don't
make that explicit). If that is sufficient for [your]
purposes then you do have all you need in the standard
ARQ."
Then he says:
"However what I was able to confirm from my look at
live data a couple of weeks ago and is also held in the
underlying raw logs is confirmation that the reversal
was generated by the system (and not manually by the
user). What might also be available in the underlying
logs is whether or not the system was rebooted -
I suspect it was but have no evidence one way or the
other (and it isn't in what was extracted this time
either). I can confirm that the user did log on
again ..."
And so forth. Now, just pausing there, you would
agree, wouldn't you, that if we go back to paragraph 154
of your witness statement at page 34 {E2/5/34}, let's
look at what you say there, top of page 35 if we may
{E2/5/35}:
"... mistakenly claim that the relevant reversal was
issued in error by Horizon, not the subpostmaster."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Well, we can see from what Gareth Jenkins has actually
said in the actual document you are looking at, that
that's wrong, can't we, the reversal was not done by the
subpostmaster, it was done by the system?
A. It was done by the system absolutely, yes.
Q. It was done by the system and not by the subpostmaster?
A. Yes, it was done by the system, yes.
Q. So it's fair to say that what we have at paragraph 154
is wrong, isn't it?
A. "... the relevant reversal was issued in error by
Horizon ..."
It wasn't issued in error, it was actually issued by
Horizon. So I am obviously not be making myself clear,
but yes, there's no question that that was done as part
of that recovery and it was system generated.
Q. Well, look, Mrs van den Bogerd, be fair, what you have
written there looks to a natural reading as suggesting
that Mr Coyne has mistakenly claimed that the relevant
reversal was issued in error by Horizon, not the
subpostmaster. The contrast is who has issued the
relevant reversal.
A. I understand. That wasn't what I was saying. There's
no question that it was issued by the system, it was
definitely generated by the system and if that's -- and
I have obviously not explained myself very clearly.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So what was the mistake then that you
refer to at the top of page 35?
A. That the reversal was an error, because the reversal
itself wasn't an error and the receipts were printed.
So in fact it was part of the recovery, the system did
go down and the BT bill actually was reversed at part of
that. So I have just misread and misexplained that
then, because I was -- there was no doubt in my mind
what had happened there -- because this was part of the
spot review by Second Sight, so I was familiar with the
detail at the time and from Helen's report what she is
saying is that it is not obvious that that reversal has
been done by the system because it is against the
Horizon user's ID and clearly it would be better if it
was obvious and I fully agree with that.
Q. But to be fair, Mrs van den Bogerd, the point that this
Helen Rose report makes is almost exactly the opposite
point to the one you were making in your statement. The
point that this report makes is that it might appear to
have been done, on the initial logs -- yes? If you just
read the beginning it shows -- look at page 2, let's go
back to page 2, {F/1082/2}. Do you see the first
answer:
"This shows that session 537803 was successfully
saved ... but when the user JAR001 logged on again
recovery reversed the session ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So it was the system that reversed the session not the
subpostmaster, wasn't it?
A. Yes, it was.
Q. And that's the opposite to what you are saying at the
top of page {E2/5/35}?
A. Okay, but that's not what I meant, because I clearly
have always known that that was a Horizon system
generated recovery and the reversal was part of that
recovery.
Q. But you were suggesting there that Mr Coyne, the expert,
had mistakenly claimed something. You weren't just
casually saying it in your witness statement, you were
pointing out that Mr Coyne had got it wrong and
positively suggesting the reversal had been done by the
subpostmaster, weren't you?
A. That wasn't my intention and I'm sorry -- clearly I have
not explained myself very well there at all, because
I was in no doubt at all that that had been generated by
the system.
Q. Well, let's go back, if we may, to F/1082 and look at
page 3 please {F/1082/3}. Halfway down there is
a question:
"I can see where this transaction is and now
understand the reason behind it. My main concern is
that we use the basic ARQ logs for evidence in court and
if we don't know what extra reports to ask for then in
some circumstances we would not be giving a true
picture."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's effectively what happened at the top of your
witness statement -- on that page in your witness
statement, isn't it? You were not giving a true picture
because you had got the wrong end of the stick?
A. Re-reading that, yes, that's correct.
Q. And then Helen Rose says:
"I know you are aware of all the Horizon integrity
issues ..."
Can you tell his Lordship what those were?
A. At this point it would have been the fact that
Second Sight were working with us investigating some of
the cases. That's all I can think that Helen means at
that point.
Q. Did you have any particular ones in mind at that point?
A. It would have been this one particularly, because as
I said this was one of the spot reviews, which is one of
the early ones that Second Sight investigated before we
actually went into the mediation scheme.
Q. Okay. And it says:
"... and I want to ensure that the ARQ logs are used
and understood fully by our operational team who have to
work with this data both in interviews and in court."
And she says:
"Just one question from my part - if the reversal is
system created but shows as an existing reversal, could
this not be reflected with a different code ie SR
(system reversed) to clear up any initial challenges.
My feelings at the moment are not questioning what
Horizon does as I fully believe that it is working as it
should, it is just that I don't think that some of the
system based correction and adjustment transactions are
clear to us on either Credence or ARQ logs."
That's what she is saying, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And that was a fair observation, wasn't it, by her?
A. That was a fair observation, yes.
Q. About the shortcomings of Credence and ARQ logs, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And Gareth Jenkins' answer:
"I understand your concerns. It would be relatively
simple to add an extra column into the existing ARQ
report spreadsheet, that would make it clear whether the
reversal basket was generated by recovery or not.
I think this would address your concern. I'm not sure
what the formal process is for changing the report
layout. Penny, can you advise as to the process: is
this done through a CR?"
Do you know what a CR is?
A. Change request.
Q. Change request, okay. Then at the bottom:
"I do believe that the system has behaved as it
should and I do not see this scenario occurring
regularly and creating large losses. However, my
concerns are that we cannot clearly see what has
happened on the data available to us and this in itself
may be misinterpreted when giving evidence and using the
same data for prosecutions.
"My recommendation is that a change request is
submitted so that all system created reversals are
clearly identifiable on both Fujitsu and Credence."
Do you know if that change request was acted on
after that?
A. I don't believe it has been acted on.
Q. You don't believe it has been?
A. I don't believe so.
Q. Can we move please now --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I have just got a question on this
document which I'm going to ask now rather than at the
end. Could we go back one page please to page 2
{F/1082/2}. You will see at the bottom of that page
there are three paragraphs in blue and then a paragraph
in black. In the bottom paragraph in blue it says:
"This scenario is fairly rare so it is certainly
quite easy for the clerk to have made a mistake and
either he or the customer could be in
pocket/out-of-pocket (depending on exactly what
happened!). The system is behaving as it should."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Am I right that the alternatives are --
"he" meaning the subpostmaster.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So the subpostmaster being in pocket,
that's one of the alternatives, is that right?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The subpostmaster being out-of-pocket.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is that the other alternative?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And the other side of those two coins is
either the customer being out-of-pocket or the customer
being in pocket.
A. That's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Are those the options?
A. Yes, those are the options.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do I appear to have missed any out?
A. No. That would have been -- on the disconnected session
receipt it would have said on there whether to -- on the
recovery whether the payment should have been made to
the customer or not and that's what the person in branch
would use to guide them with that printed receipt. But
you haven't missed any options, that's --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I haven't missed -- I have covered the
basics?
A. Yes, you have.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And those are examples of the system
behaving as it should?
A. Yes. With the disconnected session and then the
recovery receipt it would be, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Over to you, Mr Green.
Just to clarify one point, you look at -- if we
look -- let's do it from here while we are on there. We
are on this page. Can you see the paragraph three up
from the bottom:
"It isn't clear what failed ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "... but if it was a coms error, then the system would
have printed a disconnected session receipt ..."
A. Yes.
Q. And then the next sentence:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table ..."
That suggests that the receipt you are talking about
isn't recorded in the events table, doesn't it?
A. It does and that's the bit I don't understand on this,
because the receipts were printed.
Q. But look at 155 of your witness statement {E2/5/35}.
You say:
"There is therefore no indication that the reversal
was not notified to the subpostmaster."
A. Yes.
Q. But that's exactly the point that's being made,
isn't it?
A. No, no. The point is that he had the receipts.
Q. Well, I will give you one last -- I'm not going to press
it too long, but let's go back to {F/1082/2}. I just
afford you the opportunity to reconsider that answer.
You are on oath. Have a look please --
A. Sorry, sorry. So from this what he is saying is that
the receipts would have been printed.
Q. Well, just look at the third paragraph up from the
bottom. If it is because you have misunderstood what it
says let's clarify it now. Third paragraph up from the
bottom, I have just shown you the third line of that:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table suggests the counter may
have been rebooted and so perhaps may have crashed in
which case the clerk may not have been told exactly what
to do."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I do see that.
Q. Right. Now, just to be fair to you let's go back to
your statement please, page 35 {E2/5/35}. Let's take
the context very carefully and let's look at 154.3
please:
"The issue was therefore surrounding how the
transaction reversals were displayed/accessible in
branch ..."
Yes?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Now, that is correct in part, isn't it, because there
was an issue about what the subpostmaster could see in
the branch, yes?
A. Okay, yes.
Q. Right, and you then say there is no issue with Horizon
itself. Let's just park that. Look at 155. You then
say:
"There is therefore no indication that the reversal
was not notified to the subpostmaster. When recovery
was carried out a discontinued session receipt would
have been printed and messages would have been clearly
displayed to the user in branch during the recovery
process."
Now, go back please, having that in mind, to what
I have just shown you, {F/1082/2}. Third paragraph up
from the bottom, three lines down:
"The fact that there is no indication of such
a receipt in the events table suggests the counter may
have been rebooted and so perhaps may have crashed in
which case the clerk may not have been told exactly what
to do."
So it's fair to say, isn't it, that there is an
indication that the reversal may not have been notified
to the subpostmaster?
A. So from reading that then absolutely. All I'm saying is
I know that those receipts were printed because I have
seen them on an email between Second Sight and the
postmaster, so I know they were actually printed.
That's my only -- that's what I'm saying. From reading
what you said, absolutely agree, but all I'm saying here
is -- and clearly Helen Rose and Gareth at this point
didn't know that those receipts were actually printed.
Q. So you are actually giving evidence that contradicts the
document that you have referred to?
A. So all I'm saying is I know -- I know that these
receipts were printed in this scenario.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you mean in this particular instance?
A. Yes. So the Armstrong -- Mr Armstrong is the
postmaster, Lepton is the branch. This was -- it was
a spot review undertaken by Second Sight early on before
we went into the mediation scheme. Now, when they did
the initial investigation with the postmaster he didn't
know he had the receipts, so it was written in that way
and then when Second Sight went back to him before and
said -- and he actually found the receipts.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Understood.
A. Sorry if I have misled, I didn't intend to, but it's
just that I know those receipts were printed and it's --
MR GREEN: I'm glad we took it carefully to work out
precisely what you are saying.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But as far as this document is
concerned, if I understand what you have just said is
your knowledge is wider than shown on this document
alone --
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- because of the other documents you
have mentioned.
A. That's what I'm saying, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Is that a useful place to stop and you
perhaps --
MR GREEN: I've got --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, put your question, but it
sounded to me as if there was some documentary
assistance stage right which you just might want to look
at.
MR GREEN: I can understand.
But, Mrs van den Bogerd, just two separate points in
relation to this. It may be that the subpostmaster was
notified that a reversal had taken place, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. From a receipt which they don't refer to?
A. Disconnected session and the recovery receipts.
Q. But there's nothing in that documentation or what would
have been displayed at the branch to have shown the
subpostmaster how that was being recorded as who had
done it, whether it was the subpostmaster or the system,
is that fair?
A. I'm trying to recall the receipts. I think that's fair.
Q. Thank you.
A. Yes, it -- the receipt would have shown it happened, but
not --
Q. At whose behest?
A. I believe that's correct but I would need to check the
receipt, but I do believe that's correct.
Q. And we have now seen it was a system recovery not
a subpostmaster recovery?
A. It was always a system recovery.
Q. I'm grateful.
My Lord, is that a convenient moment?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes. We will actually come back at 5
past 2 just in case you need to pursue some documents.
Same form as before, break until 5 past 2, please
don't talk to anyone about the case and we will resume
then.
(1.00 pm)
(The luncheon adjournment)
(2.05 pm)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, could you look please at
{E2/5/35}, paragraph 156 of your witness statement. You
will see there you deal with changes to improve Horizon
in branch and you make a reference to the fact Mr Coyne
has picked up on the phrase "relatively small changes to
Horizon could avoid errors/mistakes made in branch", do
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. Could we look please at {F/1258} and this is a document
with a 1 October 2014 Opus date but "September 19"
written on the front. It is, as far as you remember,
a 2014 document, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And look at page 2 please {F/1258/2}:
"There are five staff related wave 1 initiatives
within finance with a cumulative run rate impact of 51
FTE and £4.8 million ..."
That's 51 full-time employees, isn't it?
A. That's correct.
Q. Let's just look at the initiatives. "Near-term process
improvements", and then "Demand reduction - make small
change in Horizon to reduce errors in branch", 3 "Demand
reduction - reduce housekeeping and other losses,
4~"Demand reduction - negotiate Santander contract to
remove manual transcription". That fourth one is
a reference to not manually transcribing data provided
by Santander, isn't it?
A. Yes, moving away from paper based.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Could you keep your voice up.
A. Sorry.
MR GREEN: And if we look at number 2, which is the one I'm
inviting you to focus on, this is making a small change
in Horizon to reduce errors in branch, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go a few pages forward to page 18 please
{F/1258/18}, do you see there under the "Executive
summary":
"A significant proportion of demand at FSC is driven
by errors/mistakes made in branch with entering in data
into Horizon. Part of these errors can be avoided with
relatively small changes to Horizon (eg related to two
part transaction for bureau pre-order, mismatches with
AEI third party kit ..."
AEI is auto exchange information, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. That's automatic exchange of information with third
parties?
A. Yes.
Q. "... top up and redemption ..."
And just look at the end of that box:
" ... the 'quantity' field for cheques and miskeys
in general ..."
Then:
"Ease of implementation: medium. There exists an
interdependency on IT for changes in Horizon to reduce
errors coming from upstream."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And so there is an interdependency with upstream data
errors because if you have got problems in the data for
example coming in from Camelot, that's not something
that the miskeying problem is going to deal with on its
own, but it is right, isn't it, that pretty much since
Horizon was introduced it had been noted that miskeying
did represent a source of errors in the branch --
I think you even said that in your witness statement for
the first trial?
A. That's correct.
Q. And we can see that the changes that were being
contemplated in October 2014 are said to be relatively
small changes, yes?
A. Yes. From this, yes.
Q. And could we look please at {F/476/1}. Now, this is
a "Summary of IS review". What does IS stand for?
A. I would assume information security.
Q. And who was Peter Laycock?
A. I don't know. I've never come across him before.
Q. The document itself says it is dated 2008. The first
item he deals with there, number one,
"Deliberate/accidental miskeying (clerk)", that's
a reference to a subpostmistress or subpostmaster,
isn't it?
A. Yes, somebody in branch, yes.
Q. Or their assistant?
A. Or their assistant, yes, but it could also include
a Crown branch as well.
Q. It could be a Crown branch. And the recommendation is:
"Double entry and cross-validation of freeform
transaction values at the counter for all financial
products ..."
So that would be one a way of dealing with it,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. An alternative might be simply to say any transaction
which is over £500 you just have to click "confirm" or
"enter" twice?
A. On the --
Q. That's another way of doing it?
A. On the Horizon system you mean, do you?
Q. Yes, on the Horizon system?
A. Yes.
Q. That would avoid some quite large losses potentially,
wouldn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the operational impact:
"May add some time to process at counter (minimal)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "System impact":
"Change to Horizon required to prompt for double
entry and cross-validation should not be overly
complicated or expensive ..."
And then "Opportunity" --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: What does "PL" mean in brackets? If you
don't know, don't worry.
A. I don't know exactly what that means in this context.
MR GREEN: I think, my Lord, we have read it as possibly
referring to comment by Peter Laycock himself, but we're
not sure.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Fine.
A. Yes.
MR GREEN: Then "Opportunity":
"c.80% reduction in disputes and claims - saving
800k per annum in compensation, agent debt and business
write-off for bill payments ..."
Etc and then:
"Staff reduction potentially at P&BA."
And if we go over the page, "Other business
benefits":
"Major improvement of point of transaction data
integrity."
That would be a good thing, wouldn't it, to improve
point of transaction data integrity?
A. Yes.
Q. "Double entry, customer sight and validation ... will
minimise balancing issues ..."
That's a good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. Deter fraudulent behaviour, that's a good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. And help to target investigations where there's lower
volume of those sort of problems?
A. Yes.
Q. And then "Operational efficiency", you see fourth bullet
point:
"Less balancing errors, productivity savings, less
calls to NBSC and partner banks."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Good thing?
A. Yes.
Q. "Increased confidence to the customer, partners,
clients, agents ..."
Et cetera. Yes? All pretty sensible and good
ideas?
A. Yes.
Q. And then we say -- we just note at the bottom there:
"Please Note – financial savings may have increased
since 2008."
So that tends to suggest the document had been
updated. Is this a document you had ever seen before or
not?
A. No.
Q. But you were aware of miskeying as an ongoing issue?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at {F/994/4} please. In fairness to you,
Mrs van den Bogerd, sorry, could we look at page 1
{F/994/1} so Mrs van den Bogerd can see what it is.
This is the miskeyed project feasibility study in 2012,
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go please to page 4 {F/994/4}, you will see
under the background section at 3.1:
"As part of the P&BA centre of excellence drive, one
of the areas of concern is the number of instances of
mis-keyed transactions that occur and much to the
detriment of P&BA. A mis-keyed transaction occurs when
an incorrect value is input by the counter clerk, which
causes a poor customer experience. The mistake can have
a significant impact on the branch and resource is
required in P&BA to manage the client and address the
error. A very large value mis-keyed transaction will
put the viability of a branch in doubt."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And we've got some statistics about how much it is
costing a year in terms of total of investigations and
so forth.
So on any view, that had potentially a pretty
serious impact for a branch, didn't it, and that was
internally recognised in that document?
A. Miskeying, yes.
Q. And on page 10 {F/994/10}, there's a risk and issues
section at 5.5:
"If nothing is done to prevent miskeying within
Horizon the current bill of £10 million will spiral out
of control."
"Recommend resolve.
"Make it happen to improve the situation where
miskeying occurs."
Then:
"Many of the workforce is not aware of the miskey
situation. It is part of this project to get the
message across to the network ..."
Et cetera. And if we then go forward -- I'm not
going to take you to them, but just looking at sample
helpline logs, if I can deal with it generally -- I'm
happy to show you them if you want but they are those
Excel ones which take a while to download.
A. Yes.
Q. But in the NBSC call logs, in the helpline call logs in
the week of 13 April 2014, which we've got in the bundle
at {F/1201}, we've got, for example, 10,789 rather than
1,089.37; in the 16 August 2015 {F/1368} we've got
19,400, should have been 1,940, that's row 1171. We've
got row 1578, 14,000 instead of 1,400.
At {F/1429}, 7 February 2016, we've got 3,400 keyed
in as 34,000 and 4,428.58 entered as 44,298.58.
Pausing there, I'm not going to show you but those
are the sorts of numbers you recognise --
A. Yes.
Q. -- as the sorts of miskeying problems that people were
encountering, is that fair?
A. Yes, that's fair.
Q. In your first witness statement you identified miskeys
as a cause of shortfalls, which I think you fairly
accepted earlier?
A. Yes.
Q. And can we look please now at {F/1449}.
Now, this document is from 31 March 2016 and
the heading is "Overkeyed online banking cash deposit
customer present - end of procedure" and then it says:
"Is the amount of the miskey greater than £150?" and
there is "No" on the left and this is what to advise
branch, it looks like the helpline:
"Advice the branch that if the discrepancy is still
apparent when balancing they must make the amount
good ..."
And then:
"If deemed necessary a transaction correction will
be sent at a later date to counteract against the
initial discrepancy."
Then "Yes":
"Advise branch that if the discrepancy is still
apparent when balancing they must make the amount good
(loss or gain)."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So in some of the examples we have seen, if it is a very
substantial sum, ie greater than £150, the right-hand
branch of that would see a branch being advised that if
the discrepancy is still apparent when they are
balancing they must make it good.
A. Yes.
Q. And that could be a very large number and that's why we
saw the previous -- the document we saw from 2014 was
saying that a large discrepancy could put the viability
of a branch in issue?
A. Yes.
Q. And the suggestion -- if you come down the middle of the
flowchart, the first box in the middle says:
"Open word document ie 'miskey A&L' or miskey
non-A&L."
That's miskey Alliance & Leicester or non-Alliance &
Leicester, isn't it?
A. Yes, that's right.
Q. Because I think Alliance & Leicester inherited the
Girobank?
A. Yes.
Q. "Complete the appropriate sections of the form by using
the information included within the incident log."
And:
"To find the miskey form follow the file path
P:\Core K Base\Miskey Forms\Miskey A&L or Miskey Non
A&L."
And then "Save a copy of the completed form to 'my
documents' and paste a copy into the incident log."
And so forth.
So that fairly reflects what's actually happened
with miskeys since the documents we have been looking
at, does it?
A. That looks like what you have read out off the NBSC.
Q. Let's now move to your examples of changes that have
been introduced, which are found at paragraph 156 and
following {E2/5/35}. These are other other changes. If
we look, for example, at the three you have chosen to
identify in paragraph 158 -- so just for some context,
you have obviously been in charge of branch support and
latterly improvement?
A. Yes.
Q. So you are the person to go to for this evidence,
aren't you?
A. For some of it, yes.
Q. And you have chosen these as -- are these good examples
of the sorts of improvement that have been made?
A. They are some examples, yes. These are the ones that
were affecting the customers and postmasters in
particular.
Q. Okay. Well, let's take them in turn, if we may. Let's
start please with Drop & Go, that's at 158.1 and 158.2
in your witness statement {E2/5/35}, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. So you point out in 158.1 that:
"In November 2014 as a result of some branches
settling Drop & Go sessions to cash instead of the
customers pre-paid account, a screen prompt was added to
the Horizon journey advising branches to not press
settle at the end of the session before they had pressed
end mails."
Then two and a half years later:
"... this was taken further as a new Drop & Go
transaction was introduced which prevented users
pressing the settle button before end mails ... the
screen prompt was removed at the same time as it was now
redundant."
A. Why he.
Q. That sounds all quite a happy experience, doesn't it, on
the face of your evidence there? It sounds as if it all
went quite well?
A. It took a while and there were quite a few problems with
Drop & Go actually. It did take a while. So there was
a first fix but a recognition at the time that it needed
to have a complete review of the transaction.
Q. Yes. That extra bit doesn't leap off the page, does it?
A. No, it doesn't.
Q. The problems and the difficulties?
A. But it was -- yes, it has been which is why it was two
stages in here, the first and then the second, but
I take your point.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at {F/1346}. So
here we're looking at 2 June 2015 and this is the ATOS
presentation and if we go over the page to page 2 please
{F/1346/2} it is referring to the online mails project,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "... to introduce a new online channel for customers
looking to send parcels via the Post Office by use of
a service called Click & Drop. The project was also
scoped with the task of aligning this new service to the
existing Drop & Go service and offering an online
channel for those SME customers. As the project
progressed, Click & Drop was descoped
during September 14 and the Drop & Go changes were
deployed on 5 November 14."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. That's the deployment of the changes you are referring
to in your witness statement, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And then it says:
"The enhanced Drop & Go service introduced a new D&G
database hosted on CDP ..."
Do you know what CDP is?
A. Core digital platform.
Q. The core digital platform:
"... and aligned the Horizon Drop & Go basket
behaviour with the standard Horizon basket
functionality."
If we just go down to the bottom of that paragraph:
"This reinstated the existing known issue of locking
customer accounts if the correct counter processes are
not followed."
You see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "Since go live a number of issues have been encountered
that have resulted in a large number of blocked customer
accounts, a resultant high volume of calls into NBSC and
dissatisfaction within branches and for impacted
customers."
If we look over the page please on {F/1346/3}, you
can see the fifth bullet point there is:
"Lessons learned that have been a captured to ensure
that other similar projects don't suffer from the same
pitfalls."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go over the page {F/1346/4-5} we can see what
was effectively happening. There is a timeline there.
And if we can just go please to the "Lessons learned" at
page 12 {F/1346/12}, "Commercial decisions over customer
experience" is the heading, "Summary":
"The decision was taken to allow a known design flaw
to continue to enable customers to use their D&G
accounts to purchase other mails products."
And then under "Limited and non-effective
communications":
"Limited training and communications were issued to
branches as this was assumed to be an incremental change
to an existing product."
And the recommendation there is:
"Branch staff should be engaged during user
acceptance testing to provide a user's view on the scale
of the change to inform the type of training and
communications approaches that should be applied."
These are the sort of things that you were referring
to in your answer that added to the text of your witness
statement, the sort of difficulties that were
encountered?
A. Yes. I wasn't aware of the exact details of what, but
I knew there were problems.
Q. Okay.
A. I can't remember the date but at some point Drop & Go
came to the branch user forum for feedback.
Q. Yes. If you want to see that I can show you where that
is. That's at {F/1194}. There's a branch user forum on
20 March. Is this the one you are thinking of,
halfway --
A. No, I wasn't at this one. So the product manager for
Drop & Go, I invited her to come and take the input from
the branch user forum whilst they were looking at the
design of the improvements going forward, so she came
a couple of times, but I wasn't at this particular one
and I usually chaired this.
Q. Will you forgive me if we just sort of press on.
A. Yes, certainly, yes.
Q. What I was going to say is you will understand why
I suggested to you that the difficulties with Drop & Go
hadn't leapt off the page?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is fair to say that it gives -- what you had
actually written included, gave a slightly rosy picture,
is that fair?
A. Without going into all that detail, yes, that's fair.
Q. And if we look please now at {F/1549}, so we're now
looking at the June 2017 changes and what was
anticipated for those changes on 7 October 2016, let's
just have a look at that please. You will see that's
the front of the document and if we look please at
page 3 {F/1549/3}. You will see there "Summary",
"Issues and options", and the box at the top says "Money
out of thin air upon timeout (introduced by prototype".
Were you aware of this difficulty that was encountered
at the time?
A. I've never heard of that terminology before.
Q. You haven't?
A. Not creates money out of thin air, I've never heard of
that.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I'm really sorry, I'm having great
difficulty hearing what you are saying.
A. Sorry. What I said is I've never heard of that
terminology: creates money out of thin air.
MR GREEN: Had you heard of the problem by another name?
A. No, not that I can recall. As I say, I knew there were
problems, but not to that detail.
Q. And what type of document is this, if we just go back to
the front? {F/1549}. Is this an operational document,
does it look like, or ...?
A. No, there would normally be another facing sheet to
a presentation, but if it was to existing prototype it
typically would be part of the project, the project --
Q. Right, an IT document?
A. Yes.
Q. I'm just asking because if we look at page 3 again
{F/1549/3}, there is a redacted column on the right.
A. Yes. It's not something I have seen before so ...
Q. Okay. If we go to page 5 please {F/1549/5}, just to
sort of take this in stages, can you see on page 5 we've
got the same heading at the top: A money out of thin air
upon time out", do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then number one in the table is "Do nothing", 2 is
"Post settle script to detect", 3 is "Monitor available
balance outside of basket", 4 is "Operate Horizon in
Drop & Go mode disabling Fast Cash and allowing settle
only against D&G account."
A. Yes.
Q. And the various risks and so forth are identified there.
Then look at number 1:
"Excess cash in till, compared to Horizon,
incentivises fraud. Remedy by FSC involves a debit
'transaction correction'."
Have you ever heard of a discussion of a debit
transaction correction being used in quotes in that way?
Is there anything ...?
A. No. That doesn't make any sense to me.
Q. Okay. Let's see -- if we go over the page to 6
{F/1549/6}, number 3 says:
"A new mode like 'back office' mode. This mode
would remove 'Fast Cash' and constrain 'settle' to just
the D&G account; also to be used by time out."
Are these things you understand or is this not
something you can really speak to, this document?
A. No, this is something I wasn't involved in, so it's not
something I can actually talk to.
Q. Just have a look if you would very kindly -- I will go
more speedily on this then. Page 10 please {F/1549/10}.
There is a diagram of what would happen and I should say
this appears to be the prototype that's being proposed:
"Start mails looks up - but does not debit - the
customer's account balance."
And then on the right:
"And credits that amount to the basket, effectively
creating cash out of thin air."
Do you see that?
A. Yes, I see that.
Q. So what we can see from this is that even reasonably
well thought through proposed changes to Horizon could
at least potentially have unintended effects. We can
see that, can't we?
A. Sorry, in the prototype you mean?
Q. Yes.
A. Okay.
Q. I mean it is obvious that this prototype has been
developed as a proposed prototype which is being
discussed fairly carefully and we can see from that that
tweaking one aspect of one function might trigger
something in another aspect of Horizon?
A. Yes.
Q. That's what we can see?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go please to page 13 {F/1549/13}, this is
"Proposed detection and correction" with Chesterfield
effectively investigating and then at (e):
"A matching credit to a 'write-off' account so that
the cash that appeared out of nowhere returns to
nowhere."
That seems to be sort of getting the imaginary cash
to vanish out again out of the account?
A. Yes.
Q. On the face of it, doesn't it?
A. It does.
Q. Then just look over the page, last point on this,
page 14 {F/1549} if you would:
"1. The reason for the transaction correction
is ..."
This is the critique:
"The reason for the transaction correction is opaque
to the branch ..."
For a reason that perhaps we can't see. That would
obviously be undesirable, wouldn't it, to have --
A. Yes.
Q. And then 3:
"The initial credit to the basket offends against
the conventions of double entry bookkeeping."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Because you are getting a figure pop up without
a corresponding figure. And then:
"Routine use of write-offs is inappropriate and
unacceptable to Ashley Hall's team."
So that's the critique. Having seen that, there
were clearly not only some problems with Drop & Go that
you were aware of and its development, but also some
others, is that fair?
A. That would be fair.
Q. If we just look very quickly at {F/1640}. That's
an email chain and if we can look at page 3 where it
begins {F/1640/3}, if you look at the bottom message,
you will see:
"Hi,
"This is to get feedback from model office and for
POL to confirm the release to the 54 pilot branches with
the pilot to commence on Friday 28.04."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then "Minor fix is required" in the next message up
on the right-hand side, "Currently in progress for the
pilot"?
A. Yes.
Q. And then 27 April at 11.26:
"From discussions with Jeff Smyth due to the
negative impacts of 15.92 on other projects the POL
recommendation is that the Reference data for Pilot is
NOT to be released on Friday."
And then at the top:
"After having had a conversation between yourselves
on the below impact ... it now transpires that the code
cannot be released ... as per the agreement yesterday.
"Can you please have a discussion and let me know
what has been decided and as a result the retrospective
action be taken in the next 30 minutes. Note the code
has gone into MO and we are planning to move ahead to
pilot tomorrow unless someone lets me know in the next
30 minutes."
And if we go to page 2 {F/1640/2} at the bottom we
see:
"My understanding is that the live code that is
deployed in the MO has broken the existing live code for
telecoms that is already live in the rest of the network
estate. If we were to deploy it (beyond MO) we will
create a P1/P2 issue in the live network estate which is
a crazy thing to do."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then if you just look at the penultimate paragraph:
"I've already checked with Rob H and Mick M on this
one - we cannot consciously put code live if we know it
will break the bigger network, especially on the run-up
to a bank holiday."
A. Yes.
Q. Did you ever hear about the fact that there was a risk
of a break to the bigger network in the run-up to a bank
holiday, sort of 30 minutes away?
A. No.
Q. Did that -- no?
A. No. I mean the whole point of testing the model is
obviously to see what the impact of it would be and
obviously that's what they said will be the impact if it
were to go live.
Q. So it's fair to say, isn't it, that there's quite a lot
that goes on in the background that maybe doesn't get
quite up to your level, would that be fair?
A. This would be routine. To go into the model office for
testing, it would be routine, yes.
Q. But it was going beyond the model office to the pilots,
that's the point. That's what they're about to do,
isn't it?
A. But once it got the go ahead from the model office --
Q. Yes.
A. And I haven't read all of it, but just reading what you
have taken me to, what I read from this is that it found
that it would break something else.
Q. So they stopped it just in time?
A. That's what I would anticipate from this, yes.
Q. Okay. Let's look at cheque rem out, the cheque rem out
problem, that's paragraph 158.3 of your witness
statement at page 36 {E2/5/36}. Now, errors in relation
to the remming out of cheques go back pretty much to the
beginning of Horizon. They have been an issue over
time, haven't they?
A. They had been an issue, yes.
Q. And you have pointed here to an improvement that's made.
A. Yes.
Q. And you say there:
"This was a change to bring all the steps in the
cheque rem out process onto a single screen and automate
the calculation of the cheques total for the counter.
This was prompted because branch staff occasionally
forgot to complete the process fully due to
interruptions, allowing extra cheque transactions to
occur mid-process from other counter positions."
Now if we look please at F/1129 and have a look at
page 4 of that document please {F/1129/4}. This is the
Horizon improvements workshop and 1.5 is "Rem out for
end of day cheque processing", "Summary":
"Customer cheques accepted during the trading are
processed at end of day. The clerk performs the
following process ..."
You see remming them out and then over the page
{F/1129/5} we have got:
"This is a lengthy process and unnecessarily runs
the report twice. It also increases the potential for
the clerk to enter an amount which does not match the
report total amount."
And then just below the diagram:
"Having reconciled the results against the physical
cheques they then navigate to back office, rems and
transfers, out to cheques, cheques and enter the total
amount to rem out and settle ... they then have to
navigate again to back office, reports, cheques and
preview or print the report. Finally they have to cut
off the report.
"Suggested improvements.
"An improvement could be to provide an additional
button on the counter daily cheques listing screen to
invoke the cheque rem out process and return when
complete."
So it is quite a good idea, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that fairly indicates what the problem was and what
the proposed solution was going to be. If we look at --
so that's 5 September 2013. If we go to {F/1225}
please, 25 June 2014 and you will see if we go to
page --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This has got August 2013 in the middle
and September 2013 in August writing at the bottom. It
doesn't seem to have June 2014. I'm not saying it
isn't June 2014, I just can't see June 2014.
MR GREEN: My Lord, in fact if I can just deal with the
version control. If we go -- we've got the wrong
document up there.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you want 1125 or 1225?
MR GREEN: We want 1225.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's probably the explanation.
MR GREEN: I probably called it out wrong.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: No, no -- it doesn't matter. Is that
the one?
MR GREEN: That's the one, 25 June 2014. And this is branch
support programme. So this is June 2014; you were
involved in the branch support programme at this time?
A. Yes.
Q. And we can see at the bottom KPIs, key performance
indicators.
A. Yes.
Q. "The programme will track performance against the
following key performance indicators ..."
And then your name is alongside Gayle Peacock's at
the bottom there.
A. Yes.
Q. If we go over the page please we see there is "Programme
progress" and if we go forward a page to item 4.4 on
page 3 {F/1225/3}:
"Horizon system transaction improvements ... the end
of day cheque remittance process has been reviewed and
a new solution to drive out errors has been identified.
This will be scheduled for the next software release
in October 2014 will reduce the calls into NBSC and the
transaction corrections issued by [the FSC]."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that was what the intention was, was October 2014.
Then if we go forward please to {F/1323}, this document
is -- at the very bottom of it says 9 March 2015, do you
see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go to page 4 please {F/1323/4} we can see that
the first draft of the document was actually
3 February 2015, yes?
A. Yes -- sorry, yes.
Q. And if we go forward one further page {F/1323/5},
"Associated documents", we have the change proposal for
cheque rem out just there at item 7 in the top box, do
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So it hadn't actually come in in 2014 October, had it?
A. No.
Q. And in fact your witness statement confirms it was
brought in in August 2015?
A. Yes.
Q. And when it did come in it made things a lot easier for
subpostmasters?
A. Yes.
Q. Was there any reason why that couldn't simply have been
done within a couple of years when the problem had been
noticed?
A. So when I picked it up in the branch support
programme --
Q. I'm not criticising you, I'm just saying is there any
reason why that change could not have been made in say
2002?
A. Well, it depends what else was going on at the time, but
I mean on the face of it --
Q. There isn't any real reason, is there?
A. On the face of it that was quite a straightforward ...
Q. Yes.
A. And it did take -- it took me longer to get it
introduced than I would have liked anyway. It didn't
cost an awful lot of money to get it sorted either, so
ideally I would have liked it --
Q. Ideally it would have been better to do it a long time
ago?
A. Yes.
Q. If we can move forward now please to bureau de change at
paragraph 158.4 in your witness statement which is back
on page {E2/5/36}. Do you see there:
"Bureau de change automated 2nd receipt. This was
a change to Horizon in September 2014 to introduce
a function defining the number of copies of a receipt
for a transaction which will automatically be printed.
This was prompted because some branches were being
defrauded by the use of fraudulent debit cards for
bureau transactions. If the counter clerk did not print
a second receipt for the branch to keep (showing
4 digits from the card number ... (a fraudulent
transaction would not be refunded by the card issuer."
A. Yes.
Q. So from a practical point of view what was going to be
proposed was that there would be assistance to try and
help avoid the problem of a second receipt not being
printed?
A. Yes.
Q. Shall we just look at how that actually happened. If we
look at {F/1129} and you can see this is back in the
Horizon improvements workshop in 2013.
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go to page 5 of that document please
{F/1129/5}. That is effectively -- if we just look at
"Travel money debit card branch receipt" at the bottom,
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. 2.1:
"When a clerk sells travel money to a customer, and
the customer pays by a debit card, the security check
responses performed by the transaction and card details
are printed on the session receipt at settlement.
"The clerk can request a duplicate session receipt,
but if they do not and proceed with another customer,
then the reprint is no longer available to the clerk."
So a moment's inattention and they are at risk of
underwriting any fraud which otherwise the bank would
bear?
A. Yes.
Q. And that has always been like that?
A. Yes.
Q. For years?
A. Yes.
Q. And it says there -- it explains:
"If the bank subsequently challenges the
transaction, the postmaster needs to provide proof that
the security checks were performed. They cannot do this
without a receipt and may therefore have to make good
the transaction and be out-of-pocket."
Then the suggested improvement is to print
a duplicate branch receipt when the travel money is paid
for by debit card:
"In order to be consistent with other receipts this
should probably indicate it is a branch copy."
That's pretty straightforward, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And it avoids that risk of a moment's inattention taking
literally one key press beyond where they can get back
to get what they need, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look please at {F/436} you can see there this
is an old document, this is a 2008 document, and we can
see on page 57 of that, if we may, {F/436/57} that the
system automatically prints the customer receipt for the
transaction, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. At the bottom. Then if we go over the page {F/436/58},
this is the point about subpostmasters being told:
"You must print a duplicate ...(Reading to the
words)... information is mandatory ..."
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you reading from?
MR GREEN: Just at the top, my Lord "Please note".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes.
MR GREEN: So press the "feed" key on the printer, so you
have to remember to print the "feed" key on the printer
and then request a duplicate receipt as a branch copy,
that's what they have to remember to do.
A. That's right.
Q. So that was the old system. The short point is that was
actually quite a simple thing to change again,
wasn't it?
A. Yes it was.
Q. It was a good idea which was fairly simple to execute
which you brought in?
A. Yes.
Q. And there wasn't really any big reason why that couldn't
have been done ages ago?
A. My view was -- when I learned of the problems that
people were having with it, is that -- if a receipt is
required as part of the transaction my view was it
should have always been automatically produced.
Q. Yes.
Now can we move forward to one of your responses to
what Mr Coyne has said in relation to MoneyGram please.
If we look at paragraph 161 of your witness statement
{E2/5/36}, you say:
"Turning to the MoneyGram example referenced by
Jason Coyne, in October 2015 MoneyGram and Post Office
agreed jointly to introduce debit/credit card acceptance
for payment ... this change was aimed at making
MoneyGram at Post Office more attractive for
customers ..."
And then at 162:
"Accepting debit/credit cards as a method of payment
is familiar to branch staff, however, processing
a refund for MoneyGram card payments is different so the
instruction given to branches is to liaise with NBSC to
ensure the branch is walked through the correct
process."
A. Yes.
Q. "This was an added step check to prevent the branch
making an error."
So one way of reading that is to suggest that when
this was brought in branches were told to liaise with
NBSC. That's what it naturally reads, is that right?
A. Yes. It did have instructions of what to do, but the
fallback was ring NBSC, because it didn't happen very
often anyway.
Q. Okay, well, let's just look at that in a tiny bit more
detail, if we may. Let's look please at {F/1382}. This
is a 1 October 2015 document, "New and improved
MoneyGram service", and it says in the highlighted
passage:
"The Horizon transaction screens have been designed
to help you transact these services simply and
compliantly. Please refer to Horizon Help for
operational instructions and further information."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And then over the page {F/1382/2} on the back it says:
"Important note - the refund/cancellation process
for MoneyGram has changed.
"If a customer wants to cancel their transaction and
obtain a refund on the same day, you must ... go through
the MoneyGram refund button to cancel the transaction.
You then need to use the back office reversals process
to reverse out the transaction (this is the case for
both debit card and cash transactions)."
A. Yes.
Q. So that's if it is on the same day. And then:
"All refunds/cancellations the following day or
later ... are refunded to cash through the MoneyGram
refund button (regardless of method of payment), the
back office reversals process doesn't need to be used."
So what this is saying is if it is on the same day
you have to use the back office reversals process as
well as the refund button?
A. Yes.
Q. And otherwise you don't, yes?
A. Yes. It says cancel and then reverse, yes.
Q. Does it mean the same calendar day?
A. Yes. When you say -- well, it means on the day of its
being -- yes.
Q. The day, so if it's Tuesday, it means on Tuesday?
A. On the same day, yes.
Q. What about if it is after polling time? Do you know
what polling time is?
A. From -- so the instruction -- my understanding was it
was if it was on the same day and if it was after -- and
if it was the next day you would need to treat it
differently. That was my understanding.
Q. Yes. But taking it in stages, it just says "the day"
there, doesn't it?
A. Yes, it does, it just says the day.
Q. And it doesn't say you must speak to the NBSC, does it,
when you do a reversal?
A. Not on this one, no, it doesn't.
Q. No. So that's the October 2015 one and then if we look
please at paragraph 163 of your witness statement
{E2/5/37} where you refer to further communications to
remind branches, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And you are referring there to the first one is
3 March 2016 Branch Focus article. Can we look at
{F/1440} please. Now, we haven't got this in the
context of the Branch Focus magazine, we can't see where
it sits amongst some of the other content, but it could
be quite varied, couldn't it, in the Branch Focus?
There could be lots of --
A. I see, yes, there could be quite a number of pages in
there.
Q. We had "summer sizzlers" and other things last time.
A. Yes.
Q. But we've got the text that is said to be what was said
and we can see here, "MoneyGram refunds". If you come
down to just below "To manage customer expectations",
can you see:
"To process a MoneyGram refund to a debit card
please contact NBSC ... before completing the
transaction."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So that's on 3 March 2016 and you can see there that
this one now does say contact the NBSC, where
the October 2015 one didn't say that?
A. Yes, that's right.
Q. And Mr Patny had his problem with MoneyGram on
23 February, about ten days before this new guidance
came out, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So for the purposes of Mr Patny could we fairly rewrite
what you say at paragraph 162 on page 36 of your witness
statement, {E2/5/36}, would it be fair to say that the
instruction given to branches from 3 March 2016 was to
liaise with NBSC?
A. If that's the date of that one, yes.
Q. Yes. Then the next thing you refer to at 163.2
{E2/5/37} is the flowchart at {F/1767}. Can we have
a look at that please. So we are now in
19 February 2018. Again, we don't know exactly where or
how this was in the Branch Focus article?
A. My understanding is it was attached to that version of
it. That's my understanding, it went out with that
version of ...
Q. Well, this one seems to be 19 February 2018 this one.
Is that right? You said it is 19 February 2018 in your
witness statement?
A. Yes, because the actual diagram itself isn't dated, the
flowchart itself isn't dated on here.
Q. Yes.
A. So when I located it it was with that Branch Focus is
how it was presented to me as that's when it went out,
on that date.
Q. On which date, 19 February?
A. Whatever I have said, date -- yes.
Q. I'm just pointing out we haven't got the actual Branch
Focus --
A. No.
Q. -- we have just got the flowchart that you say went out
with it and it says "MoneyGram decision tree - refund
customer diagram V0.2". Did this definitely go out?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And can you come down from "Customer wants
a refund", if you come down to "Cancellation approved?",
if you go straight down the "Yes" arrow, "Same day
refund?" and the arrow then says "Before 7 pm cut off?"
A. Yes, I see that now, yes.
Q. Now, that is the polling time at which the branch's
business day ends, isn't it, and the branch's business
day transactions are then sent off?
A. Yes, I mean transactions continue after, but yes.
Q. They do, but that's the polling time at the end of the
business day for the branch?
A. Yes.
Q. You will probably remember sitting in court when
Mr Patny was saying he was on the phone to the helpline
to try and do his reversal at just after 7 o'clock?
A. Yes, I remember him saying that.
Q. He said a couple of times that was past polling time.
A. Yes, I remember him saying polling time, yes.
Q. Let's have a look, if we may please, at {F/1664}. Now,
this is an operations board agenda for July 2017. A lot
of it is blank, but if we could go please -- well, now
blank. If we go please to page 86 {F/1664/86}, it was
at least at this stage finally recognised I think
that -- if we go down:
"The main root causes for the increase in items
were:
"Branches retrying transactions that had failed due
to timing out."
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Where are you reading?
MR GREEN: Under "The main root causes", the second bold
heading, my Lord.
Do you see that, Mrs van den Bogerd?
A. Yes.
Q. "The main root causes for the increase in items were:
"Branches retrying transactions that had failed due
to timing out."
Because that had become a bit of a problem,
hadn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Timeouts in relation to MoneyGram transactions.
"Branches reversing a transaction but not cancelling
the AP part of the transaction."
A. Yes.
Q. Is that the authorisation process?
A. Yes.
Q. "General lack of understanding in branch of how the
process works, especially for refunds."
And then:
"MoneyGram and POL systems were out of sync re
cut-off times. Poll cut off at 19.00 and MoneyGram at
24.00."
Then in bold:
"Towards the end of 2016 changes were made to the
transaction journey and the cut-off time.
"MoneyGram changed their cut off time ..."
Et cetera and also:
"The end to end transaction journey time was
extended from approximately 8 seconds to 30 seconds."
That was in order to try and stop the timing out
happening?
A. Timing out, yes.
Q. And then there are some next steps listed:
"More work being done to establish the root cause of
error (branch conformance/product complexity)."
So it is right, isn't it, that in fact the issue of
MoneyGram was a little bit more complicated, because
initially it didn't say "Contact the NBSC"?
A. Yes it changed, yes.
Q. And then that then changed. And then there was
a flowchart which for the first time mentioned the 7 pm
rather than the calendar day, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And distinguished between pre-7 pm and post and then
eventually at the end of 2016, as reflected in the 2017
document, the polling days for Post Office and MoneyGram
were then aligned?
A. Yes. The flowchart was the best, I think, communication
out to the network around the stages to go through.
Q. Okay. Let's just look, if we may, at {F/1556} please
and if you could look very kindly -- you see that's
a 21 October 2016 document. Have you seen that before?
A. I don't recall. I don't recall seeing this actual
document, but I was party to some of the operations
duplication work.
Q. Let's look please at page 4 {F/1556/4}.
A. Sorry, what date did you say this document was?
Q. This document seems to be 21 October 2016. Does that
make sense?
A. Okay, yes.
Q. If we have a look at page 16 of it {F/1556/16} we've got
the document history and you will see the version
history at the bottom and it says initial draft,
30 September 2016, Andy Greening. Who is he?
A. He is one of the change analysts.
Q. One of the change analysts. Do you know him?
A. Yes.
Q. And you have worked with him?
A. Yes.
Q. Review by Dawn Brooks. Who is she?
A. Dawn used to be a change analyst, one of the managers,
in FSC.
Q. And is Andrea Horner doing the same job as well?
A. Andrea Horner was a project manager with us, she was
a contractor with us for a short time.
Q. Okay. So it seems to be anyway a document, the date of
which is in October 2016, and if we just look please at
page 4 {F/1556/4} there is a management summary:
"Post Office branch 'back office' balancing and
accounting processes are still rooted in legacy
practices and methods. These operations processes and
associated workflows are inefficient and susceptible to
losses and fraudulent activity. Many business rules are
ill-defined and the language is confusing to those who
operate the processes."
Now, some of those who are operating processes are
in FSC dealing with supposed shortfalls from
Post Office's point of view, yes?
A. They would be, yes.
Q. People deciding on transaction corrections?
A. Yes.
Q. And also of course one shouldn't forget the
subpostmistresses and subpostmasters who have got the
other end of these processes in a sense?
A. Yes.
Q. And it is the reconciliation of the back office data and
the front office entered data that causes a discrepancy,
isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at "Drivers for change", 1.2, it says:
"There is a requirement for balancing and
reconciliation processes to be intuitive and easy to
operate and for those processes to use simple language
and applied business rules that negate the requirement
for excessive training in branches and back office
support services."
So what really you are saying there is this should
be absolutely intuitive on the Horizon system and in the
processes that relate to it?
A. Yes.
Q. So that you don't have to go and explain super
complicated things to people in branch and then have
mistakes which then have to be sorted out. Is that
fair?
A. Absolutely.
Q. And that's obviously a good idea?
A. Of course.
Q. And there's a requirement for integration of data into
Post Office Limited's front office systems, which is
basically the Horizon facing system for the SPMs?
A. Yes.
Q. And that would obviously be a good idea as well, in that
if the front office data and the back office data was
visible in the front office, they would be able to see
both?
A. Yes.
Q. These are all good ideas and it's not surprising that
you think they are good ideas because you are the person
who signs off on this document at the end on page 17
{F/1556/17}.
A. Yes.
Q. Did it begin to seem familiar when we were going through
it?
A. So -- yes, absolutely. So ATM, so ... I don't
absolutely recall this particular document if I'm
honest, but --
Q. You remember the broad points, trying to streamline the
back-end office processes?
A. Absolutely. So at this time -- and I can't be sure of
the dates, but I was the director of support services,
so FSC was under my remit at the time and what
I particularly wanted to do was try to get things right
at the front end to stop driving -- obviously right for
the front end in the first place but then to stop
driving, as you have described, the workarounds and the
activity to put right things that should have been right
in the first place.
Q. I understand.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, you have to keep an eye on the
clock for the shorthand writers.
MR GREEN: My Lord, would that be a convenient moment?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I imagine you have more than five
minutes.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I have. I'm not going to finish with
Mrs van den Bogerd today but I will be finished well
before lunch tomorrow and we are timetabling everyone
else to fit in --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This is day one of your four days.
MR GREEN: Indeed.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mrs van den Bogerd, you heard that
exchange so apparently you are still going to be in the
witness box tomorrow but we will have a break now for
the shorthand writers so we will come back at 20 past 3.
Same as before, don't talk to anyone about the case.
(3.14 pm)
(Short Break)
(3.22 pm)
MR GREEN: Mrs van den Bogerd, just following through
a couple of further documents in relation to MoneyGram.
Can you please look very kindly at {F/1502} please. You
will see that's a MoneyGram quarterly business review,
18 July 2016.
A. Yes.
Q. And if you could look please at page 24 {F/1502/24}.
"Problem statement":
"Multiple instances of system latency have been
reported since 24 January 2016."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "The latency was exposed by changes to the IT
environment in the January release."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So it has come to the fore after the January release of
the software, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it identifies the purpose and benefits and then
fourth bullet point at the bottom of that page:
"This latency is causing some transactions on the
POL system to time out, resulting in high traffic to the
operational contact centres and obvious customer
impact."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go over the page please {F/1502/25} we can
actually see the "Instances of latency since February"
diagram shows weeks commencing 22February onwards, can
you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And 22 February 2016 is the highest one by quite
a margin, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And 23 February is when Mr Patny has his difficulties,
isn't it, with MoneyGram?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go forward please to {F/1502/29}, do you remember
Mr Patny thought that he had got a duplicate
transaction?
A. Yes.
Q. 3,100 and then he seemed to have 6,200 --
A. Yes.
Q. -- was what he thought had happened. Look at the bottom
of that page, "Reconciliation":
"Duplicate transactions are created in [MoneyGram]
systems as a result of Post Office time outs.
"A joint MG/POL team is working to ascertain impact
on settlement and implementation of an appropriate plan
of action."
A. Yes.
Q. It wasn't wildly well advertised to subpostmasters that
this problem was being dealt with at the time?
A. No. People were aware there was an issue, clearly, in
branch and then --
Q. People in the branch had an issue, but they were
probably being blamed for user error, weren't they?
A. Well, they knew there was an issue and they were ringing
into NBSC at the time.
Q. Sorry?
A. They knew there was an issue and they were ringing into
NBSC at the time.
Q. Well they were claiming there was an issue but they
might be met with "This is user error"? They didn't go
"Oh, by the way, have a look at the graph which shows
there has been a spike in the very week I'm complaining
about" because they didn't have that information,
did they?
A. Not unless there was a message on the helpline system.
I'm not aware --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: When did you first see this document?
A. This document, now.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You haven't seen this before today?
A. I've not seen this before, no.
MR GREEN: Okay. Let's look, if we may, at {F/1555}. This
is a "Small project proposal", "Hot house - MoneyGram
issue", "Pricing for additional work". And then
"Description of requirement" box halfway down:
"Background:
"MoneyGram summary.
"For the last several months Post Office has
experienced a live operational issue with MoneyGram
transactions across the branch network. In the event of
a transaction timing out at the counter, a system error
message is displayed to the user ... and the transaction
is aborted. This leaves no record of the transaction at
the counter and the transactions and funds may or may
not have been committed in the MoneyGram domain. This
causes significant issues for Post Office and MoneyGram
and for customers."
And then:
"End to end testing has been commissioned to
identify the cause of the problem. Within the first
hour of testing the ATOS test team were able to identify
the issue as CDP returning an incorrectly formatted
(SOAP error message) response to the counter which
results in a system error rather than a time-out
response ..."
And if we just look at the bottom three lines of
that box:
"A quick fix has been identified by the ATOS team to
amend the existing AP-ADC reference data to treat the
system error as a time-out response and trigger the
correct counter behaviour."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. So that does suggest, doesn't it, that there was a real
problem that was not very easy for the person at the
counter to deal with correctly?
A. Yes. They had an error message, but yes.
Q. This document is dated 19 October 2016, as we can see,
top right?
A. Yes, I can see that.
Q. Yes. And it is addressing something that was a result
of the January release of software?
A. Yes.
Q. So that had actually persisted for the whole of
February, March, April, June, July, August, September,
October, nearly the whole of October as well, yes?
A. From the graph you showed, yes.
Q. If Post Office had commissioned ATOS earlier -- if they
had been asked to look at it earlier, it looks as if
they would have got an answer more swiftly, because they
found it in the first hour of testing, didn't they?
A. Yes.
Q. Just looking at that from Post Office's position, does
that look satisfactory to you?
A. I don't understand why it took so long.
Q. No.
A. On the face of it, no.
Q. Let's look at other matters that you deal with in your
witness statement, if we may. Paragraphs 178 and 179
{E2/5/41}, you are talking there about volume of
branches and volume of customer sessions. You can see
that the point you make at 179 over the page {E2/5/42}
is you give the example of the Barkham branch as
an example, being the branch that Mrs Stubbs was
subpostmistress for, raises a number of matters that you
have responded to. You were able to see that the
workload for this particular branch in 2001 involved an
average of 1,047 weekly customer sessions and in 2007
this increased to 1,836, yes? And that's information
that you got from the spreadsheet that we see on the
previous page referred to there, is it?
A. Yes.
Q. Can we look please at {H/172}, which is a letter from
Post Office's solicitors dated 18 January. You will see
there the second line of 1.1 -- do you see in the
middle?
A. Yes.
Q. They are talking about your witness statement:
"It has come to our attention that this spreadsheet
contains an error due to the internal referencing that
means, while the actual volumes of customer sessions is
correct, they do not correspond correctly with the
relevant branches. We therefore write to enclose a copy
of the correct version of the volume of customer
sessions spreadsheet for your reference."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. Were you made aware of that change? Do you know that
that change happened?
A. No.
Q. Okay. This may not be fair to you, but let's just look
at it. You have referred in your witness statement, we
have seen, to the Barkham branch as an example.
A. Yes.
Q. I have just shown you that the point you make about
customer sessions going up from 1,047 to 1,836. Let's
look please at the corrected spreadsheet which is at
{F/1837}.
Is this something that you actually know about, or
is this something someone asked you to put in your
statement?
A. What, the volume of branches in the --
Q. Yes? I mean is this really your evidence at all?
A. I know about branches and how they have changed over the
years, yes.
Q. Okay, so you felt comfortable giving the evidence?
A. Well, I spoke to Kjetil, a colleague of mine.
Q. Spoke to ..?
A. Kjetil.
Q. Full name?
A. Kjetil Fuglestad.
Q. That's the person you mention in your witness statement
{E2/5/41}.
A. So Kjetil manages all the data on the network, the size
of -- the number of branches, volume of transactions,
everything that goes through that; that's what he does.
Q. So he would be a reliable person to get this information
from?
A. Yes.
Q. If we look at line 254 please if we look there we can
see the Barkham branch and we can see there that the
figures between 2001 and 2007 were in fact 398 and 368;
do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And they weren't the figures that you gave in your
witness statement of 1,047 and an increase up to 1,836.
So in fact they have gone down those figures, haven't
they?
A. Mm-hm. Yes.
Q. And they are quite a lot smaller?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know how that error has come about?
A. I don't. Because I had a conversation with Kjetil
around the data and then told him what I wanted and he
provided it to me, so I don't know --
Q. Could you speak up a tiny bit.
A. Sorry. I had a conversation with Kjetil around the
information that I was looking for and then he provided
it to me, so I have no idea how this data would have
changed, or been incorrect in the first place.
Q. Okay. Well, let's move on to your description of the
implementation of Horizon and Horizon Online. Let's
look at paragraph 180 of your statement please
{E2/5/42}. You say there:
"In relation to the practical implementation of
Horizon and Horizon Online in branches, Post Office
representatives were present as explained below."
Then you say at 181:
"It is my understanding that branches were required
to do their final paper based cash account before the
change over to Horizon. The information was then
transferred onto the Horizon system ..."
Using the physical cash and stock held, et cetera,
as could be agreed with the subpostmaster:
"The transfer onto Horizon was supported by the
Horizon field support officer ... and also the RNM. If
there were any issues as to discrepancies/general
functionality ... [they] would assist the branch."
Then Horizon Online, 183:
"Before the change to Horizon Online a cash check
was completed in branch by the HFSO."
That's the Horizon field support officer?
A. Yes.
Q. You have defined in 182:
"Branches were notified in advance that this cash
check would be carried out. I recall that this
mandatory cash check across the entire network caused
a temporary spike in declared losses. I suspect that
this was due to branches tidying up their accounts
before the cash check and therefore losses coming to the
surface that had previously been ignored or covered up."
Now, that doesn't on the face of it suggest any
difficulties particularly encountered by SPMs on the
introduction of either Horizon or Horizon Online,
does it, your account?
A. No, it just states what the process was, yes.
Q. Yes, it is process based, but it doesn't hint at any
difficulties they encountered that might explain a spike
in discrepancies, for example when Horizon Online was
introduced, anything like that?
A. So that was done -- so what I'm referring to there is
the spike before it went onto online.
Q. Okay.
A. So it was at the point at which it was done in advance
of and then carried over.
Q. Well, let's have a look. Let's just take a step back.
We might be able to take it more shortly. I mean do you
actually personally know what the introduction of
Horizon was actually like for the SPMs affected by it?
A. Going from paper based to Horizon, is that what you ..?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes I do.
Q. And there were quite a lot of problems, weren't there?
A. There were some. I was supporting -- when I refer to
the RNM, I was one of -- I was an RNM at the time, yes.
Q. And there were quite a lot of problems with the software
and hardware?
A. At that time I can only talk about what my experience
was.
Q. And what was your experience?
A. So we had some issues in -- where I worked in the local
area, but we were out in branch supporting and making
sure that everything was okay. So there would be the
odd -- from recollection, because it was a long time
ago, there were the odd one or two issues that we had.
I wasn't aware of the picture across the business at the
time.
Q. Okay. Let's just have a quick look, let's look at
{F/16/2} please. This is PEAK 0027887. And it is
created on 21 July 1999 and this is the one that we have
seen at the end of last week, on Thursday last week.
There's a receipts and payments misbalance which is
escalating and it gets up to £1.05 million. Do you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. And that's quite a large number for a small branch to
have gone astray, isn't it?
A. Well, for any branch. Any branch that would be --
Q. That's not going to be a real amount of cash --
A. No.
Q. -- that the SPM has put in her pocket, is it?
A. No.
Q. Or quite a lot of stamps or anything like that?
A. No.
Q. And look at page 3 please {F/16/3}. You can see in the
bottom box:
"The initial balance brought forward for this CAP
was [1.196 million]. This was multiplied twice to give
a total ... of 2,279,189.04."
There was a £1 million discrepancy:
"This was due a known software error which has no
been resolved."
Is that "not been resolved" or "now been
resolved" --
A. I don't know.
Q. -- can you remember this one?
A. No.
Q. Okay. So that's quite a serious one. Let's have a look
at a couple more examples. {F/22} please. This is
10 November 1999. PM Dungannon. This is PEAK 0033128
and you can see there that there's a discrepancy of
£43,000. Halfway down the first box:
"Outlet has a discrepancy of £43,000 after balancing
[stock units] and doing office snapshot."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. "... investigating why this misbalance occurred."
If we look at the entry for 3 December 1999, which
is down towards the bottom:
"I have talked with development ref this problem.
It is seen as a one-off. No fault can be found and
developments do not expect to be able to find a fault
with the evidence available. There is no additional
information available as evidence. I suggest this call
be placed on monitor for 1 month."
And then 18 February 2000, if we go over the page on
page 2 {F/22/2}, if you look there can you see "Further
examination of the event logs", do you see that?
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Whereabouts?
MR GREEN: It is the big box, 18 February, 17.07, my Lord,
and we come down --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, got it.
MR GREEN: "Further examination of the event logs for these
two counters indicate that counter 5 looks suspect
(C drive nearly full with big gap of no messages).
Calls from PO into HSH for period ... indicate a reboot
(counter not specified but would tie in with counter 5
event log) ..."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And then straight after that, can you see underneath
Saturday 31 October 1999 it says:
"The evidence in the message store was that messages
continued to be written to the message store but that
all the 'payment' transactions which should have been
recorded in the rollover trailer messages failed to
appear (although others did, such as rem out and
transfer out totals). This indicates that the problem
was not one of running out of disc space but of failing
either to retrieve, or write out, transaction totals for
one particular node in the node hierarchy.
"Given that there were known problems with corrupted
persistent object indexes at about this time, it is
possible that an update on an EPOSS nodes object failed
to be registered correctly at the outlet, causing the
node accumulation to fail."
Now, on the face of it there was a £43,000
discrepancy in November 1999 and the underlying
information wasn't actually rechecked until February the
following year, on the face of this, yes?
A. That's what it looks like, yes.
Q. Let's go forward please to page 3 {F/22/3} and we're
going to look at the entry for 7 April which you can
see -- sorry, if you look at the top can you see there
there's a further occurrence for 9,000, do you see that?
A. In Appleby?
Q. Yes. And then that's then escalated and then at the
bottom of that box a fix, penultimate paragraph:
"A fix has been developed and is currently in
testing."
Do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go down to 4 July 2000 at the bottom, it says:
"Root cause of stock unit integration problem.
"Data trees have been failing to build fully, and
the system has not been detecting this. Consequently,
discrepancies in the balancing have been occurring. In
the case of Dungannon a whole payments node was missing.
There have been a number of calls relating to this kind
of issue. A fix has been put in at CI4 which will
prevent this happening. The root cause identified ...
is as follows: 'data server trees have failed to
build ..."
So what we can see there is the sort of problem that
was being encountered is not only an error occurring but
the system failing to spot that the error was occurring,
yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go forward please to {F/89} we will see the
ICL Pathway customer service management support unit
monthly incident review for November 2000 and if we look
at page 6 quickly {F/89/6} -- sorry, I shouldn't -- fair
to you. If we look at page 6, do you see the second
bullet point:
"The most frequently occurring incidents in November
were both types of receipts and payments incidents
(migration and post migration) with 31 incidents per
category. The migration incidents have remained at the
same level ... post migration occurrences have
increased. This was followed by 17 transactions polled
by TIP but not by HAPS, these were due to delayed
transactions as reported ..."
And so forth. Then they were added back into normal
processing.
We can see there that at the top bullet point, key
point:
"During November the number of incidents received by
MSU increased to 109, in comparison to October where 91
received and resolved ... a total of 98 incidents were
cleared and 13 will be carried forward ..."
So there was quite a lot of activity in terms of
trying to clear incidents that were coming in of this
type, weren't there?
A. Yes.
Q. And we can see in December, which is at {F/84}, that's
the December document of the same type, let's have
a look again at page 6 quickly {F/84/6} --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I rise simply to say these
are Fujitsu documents, these are not Post Office
documents, but I'm sure your Lordship is well aware of
the limitations in this witness' ability to speak to
these documents.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, she has given broad evidence of
these types of things. You might want to just explore
when she has first seen them.
MR GREEN: Yes. Have you seen these documents before?
A. I haven't seen these.
Q. You haven't?
A. No.
Q. But you were in aware in your support role at the time
of activity of this sort going on?
A. Not in 2000 I wasn't, no.
Q. You weren't?
A. No. So in 2000 as the retail network manager I operated
in an area as part of a team of the same, so I was not
aware of this in the background.
Q. Were they giving you any feedback about the sort of
problems that Fujitsu were encountering?
A. No, no. So the process we had in place was we had
a roll-out plan of the branches that would migrate. We
organised ourselves in what we called a cluster group at
the time and we made sure that we had one of us as
an RNM was on-site to support the migration and then
subsequently some of the balances going forward as well,
because there were some issues with the balances, but
I wasn't aware of any of this in the background.
Q. So you are the person listening to the SPMs saying
"Look, I have a problem with it".
A. Yes.
Q. But you weren't being provided with any background
information --
A. No.
Q. -- about what the categories of problems being
encountered were?
A. What I would do in my role then is if I had a -- if one
of my postmasters had a problem then I would go and
check their accounts with them, go through all the
information and there was one issue that I do remember
where there was an issue with a postmaster that always
balanced and on this particular day he didn't. It was
very unusual. I checked everything and then I made
a call to Chesterfield, which wasn't called FSC then, it
was called P&BA and they resolved the problem from
there. I don't know exactly. All I know is he was
happy it was resolved.
Q. Let's look at that specific example. They didn't give
you feedback about what had gone wrong, if anything?
A. No.
Q. So you weren't able to form a view about that?
A. No. So my understanding was what to do in the
situation, if we had a situation like that, then I would
escalate it and then the process would kick in behind
because I was on to the next Post Office to support.
Q. Okay. So is it fair to say --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Just pausing there, this might speed
things up because there are two different strands you
are running at the same time.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The first thing is just a point of
clarity. I don't think these are actually Fujitsu
because I think at the time it was ICL; that's right,
isn't it?
A. That would have been at the time, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: You were a retail network manager.
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So the problems that you experienced,
that you had direct experience of, they were the
problems from the branches that were under your
umbrella, is that right?
A. Yes, that's correct.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Did you get any communications back from
other areas about problems they were having, or was your
involvement solely in respect of the branches in your
area?
A. So my responsibility was the branch -- it wasn't just my
area, so I think at the time there were about eight RNMs
worked out as a team so we covered a geographical area
that would cover the whole of say Cardiff, Swansea,
West Wales, which is quite a geographical error, and
then we would talk to our counterparts in Newport and so
forth, but I'm not aware of any formal communication
back to us at the time of anything to do with this at
all, other than we were there to help postmasters
resolve the issues at the time.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Understood. And then the second point
is when you were preparing your witness statement and in
particular the paragraphs at 180 to 183 --
A. Yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- did you do any investigation in
respect of what might have been happening that you
didn't know at the time in 2000 --
A. Not back to 2000, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: -- or in 2010 when the change was from
Legacy Horizon to Horizon Online?
A. So in 2010 I was in a different role and had broader
responsibility and I knew what -- what we did, again we
replicated a similar approach to make sure we supported
branches at the time, but as for any detail of
information, I didn't research into that, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Right, Mr Green.
MR GREEN: I'm most grateful.
So just quickly to follow through on your role at
the time, if you just look at page {F/99.1}. Now, this
is a document about Mr Bates' branch. It's not one we
went to in the common issues trial.
A. Yes.
Q. But this is June 2001 and I think you were still an RNM,
is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is an audit of his office and can we go down
please to page 4 {F/99.1/4}. Do you see cash management
accurately declared at the close of business; you see
that?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is the sort of document you might have seen if
an audit had been done at one of your branches?
A. Yes.
Q. And if you look under "Control gaps - high risk" and
then the next one says "Comments", it says -- and this
is from the auditor:
"A correct assessment of cash holdings could not be
made because the Horizon system intermittently adds the
previous day's cash holdings to the daily declaration."
A. Right.
Q. That's the sort of problem that you might have had to
deal with if that had happened?
A. If it had happened, then yes --
Q. In one of your branches --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, can you let the witness
finish.
A. That wasn't anything I was aware of at the time.
I never encountered that problem in one of my branches,
or in my colleagues' branches; that isn't something
I was aware of.
MR GREEN: Very well. What you would have done was taken
that forward and tried to help the SPM resolve it?
A. Yes. I mean if I had an audit report from any of my --
from my branches then I would go through it in quite
some detail, yes.
Q. I'm grateful, thank you.
Can we look now at migration to Horizon Online.
Now, this is something you would have more knowledge of,
is that fair? What happened during the migration to
Horizon Online?
A. Well, I wasn't out in the field supporting it, so it
depends when you say "more involvement".
Q. Shall we just look, if we may quickly -- I will take
this reasonably quickly, just because I think you have
had a role in talking about the introduction of
Horizon Online. Let's look at {F/555} please. This is
the Horizon Online induction training document.
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at page 8 {F/555/8} can you see that
Horizon Online:
"... is about reducing the Post Office's operating
costs ..."
A. Yes.
Q. "... and is a fundamental element of forward:
three2eleven"?
A. Yes.
Q. What's "forward: three2eleven"?
A. It was the strategic plan at the time called
three2eleven, so it was -- if I remember correctly, it
was 2003 to 2011, the years.
Q. Okay. This is a 7 December 2009 document.
A. Yes.
Q. And did you have some knowledge of what that strategy
was at the time?
A. I had a knowledge because that was -- the whole business
was engaged in what that was.
Q. Yes.
A. In terms of recalling the detail of it, I can't recall
the detail of it at this point. But it was a strap line
that everybody was aware of, absolutely.
Q. Okay. We can see from the slide that Horizon Online was
based on the principle of business equivalence: "Will
look and feel very different to existing Horizon but
will not radically change transaction processes". Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And it has "been designed to run on existing branch
equipment".
A. Yes.
Q. Then if you look in the notes, the sort of speaking
notes under the slide, we can see again it is reiterated
it is about reducing operating costs, yes, and that
Horizon is a major cost and then do you see it is not
about new functionality, on the left-hand margin just
above "Business equivalence"?
A. Yes.
Q. "It is based on the principle of Business equivalence.
Business equivalence is the primary design principle for
the programme - we are not about new functionality."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. So this wasn't really an upgrade in terms of
functionality, was it?
A. No.
Q. It was business equivalence and a way that would be --
there would be cost savings from doing it this way --
A. Yes.
Q. -- is that fair?
A. Yes.
Q. Let's look at {F/610}. This is April 2010. This is
"Operations functional report" and if we look at the
bottom, "Horizon Online high volume pilot", you can see
a few bullet points there and the bottom one is:
"Problems reported and decision made to halt further
migrations allowing further investigation and resolution
of issues."
Now, first of all did you see this document at the
time?
A. I don't recall seeing this, no.
Q. Were you aware of these issues at the time in the pilot?
Did you know it hadn't gone --
A. No not -- no.
Q. At all?
A. No, not that I can recall, but I wasn't close to the
absolute beat rate of how things were --
Q. Okay. And did you have a look at any of this sort of
documentary history before you wrote your witness
statement?
A. No, I haven't --
Q. Research what happened?
A. So a broad understanding of what happened, but I have
not seen these documents in that respect.
Q. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Mr Green, you did interrupt again.
MR GREEN: I'm so sorry.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Please don't.
MR GREEN: I'm sorry, my Lord.
If we look please at {F/588} that's PEAK 0195380 and
if we look at page 4 please {F/588/4}, 5 March 2010. In
the second box down -- do you see that?
A. In the green text, the big box?
Q. Yes, the big box.
A. Yes.
Q. "We have received notification from POL regarding the
problems at this office ... on the 1st of March at the
close of business we found that on node 5 the cash was
short of £1,000. All of the figures for that day match
the figures presented at the time of each transactions.
An instant saver withdrawal for £1,000 was transacted
that day, but I was unable to find this transaction
using the online report facility. I feel very anxious
as I believe a system error has occurred at the time of
this transaction.
"On the 2nd of March a transaction for a cash
withdrawal was completed where the system commanded
a member of staff to issue the money to the customer on
screen but the receipt printed for that transaction
printed out a decline slip. The customer was honest
enough to bring back the decline receipt a day later
with the money.
"On the 2nd of March on node 5 a £220 cash deposit
was authorised on screen but 20 minutes later the
customer brought back a receipt that stating the
transaction had declined. We contacted the NBSC as and
when the customer produced the receipt. NBSC stated
that the transaction approved on the system and had no
idea why the money was not deposited and why the decline
slip was printed.
"A rem was scanned in our system and all the figures
had doubled up. The helpline team was notified at the
time, to which they seemed more confused as to why it
happened than me!
"Another error occurred on the system when 10 items
of postage seemed to disappear for no reason halfway
through a customer's transaction. The system commanded
no money to be taken from the customer on screen or by
receipt.
"A transaction on node 2 where a car tax was entered
disappeared ..."
And so forth. Can you see?
A. Yes.
Q. This is a litany of issues that this person is raising
and it says at the bottom, about six lines up from the
bottom of that box:
"I have a deep regret in initially volunteering to
take part in this new pilot scheme, as I did not expect
to have these complications with such poor services from
the helpline.
"Unfortunately our migration officer is away ...
leaving us with no one with the means to correct our
issue today. Why should it be my liability to recoup
all the losses in this already declining business, when
these systems should have adequate contingencies for any
such problems that could or would arrive. It seems that
the helpline have left me for seven hours now without
any intention of calling us back as no one again wants
to take ownership over this problem."
Now, pausing there, were you aware at all of that
level of difficulty being encountered by people who had
volunteered for the pilot for Horizon Online?
A. No.
Q. Let's look at {F/614} please. This is a Post Office
document. It is Horizon Online programme update,
8 April 2010, do you see that?
A. Yes.
Q. And can we go to page 4 please {F/614/4}. You can see
there 614 branches live, almost 90% have a router
installed, high volume pilot suspended, NFSP have raised
concerns but remain supportive, business case and
benefits secure, Fujitsu initiated red alert and
independent reviews. Were you made aware of that within
Post Office?
A. No.
Q. Let's have a look at {F/639} please, the following
month, May 2010. If we go to page 6 please {F/639/6}
because quite a lot of it is redacted. We can see that
the document is authored by Paula Vennells, the network
director, and if we come back to page 3 {F/639/3}:
"Executive correspondence (flag cases): the
executive correspondence team are still receiving some
letters from MPs despite the current purdah. Each case
is dealt with individually ensuring that we tackle any
relevant customer issues but stay within current purdah
guidelines. Internally we are dealing with requests
from subpostmasters who would like compensation in
relation to closures following the Horizon issues over
the Easter period."
Were you aware there had been Horizon issues over
the Easter period in 2010?
A. Not that I can recall, no.
Q. Okay. Did you see this document, can you remember?
A. It would be hard to recognise it now, wouldn't it?
Q. It's very difficult, I agree.
A. So I don't think I did.
Q. Sort of striped with redactions, it's difficult.
At {F/930} we've got a pack for James Arbuthnot and
Oliver Letwin meeting scheduled for 17 May and if we
look at page 2 of that {F/930/2} we can see who the
attendees were: James Arbuthnot, who was then an MP for
North East Hampshire, Oliver Letwin, Alice Perkins, the
chairman of the Post Office, Paula Vennells, the
chief executive, Susan Crichton and Lesley Sewell and
then case review, Mr Ismay and yourself.
A. That's correct.
Q. And this was essentially the planning pack for that
meeting, wasn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we look at page 3 please {F/930/3}, in item 1,
fourth bullet point, it says:
"We are open to feedback and we will provide you the
information we have available, our aim is to be open and
transparent."
Yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And the plan was that that was to be said at the
meeting. And if we look at page 12 {F/930/12} you can
see there under "Background" do you see:
"In 2010 Horizon underwent an upgrade. The upgraded
system was tested and has the full support of the NFSP."
Bottom hole punch?
A. Yes.
Q. It wasn't really an upgrade from the perspective of
functionality for SPMs, was it, as we have already
identified?
A. No, agreed.
Q. And that doesn't give a completely clear explanation of
that, does it?
A. No, it is quite limited in what it says there.
Q. And it could be read as meaning it had been upgraded
from their perspective when the truth was it hadn't?
A. Yes. I mean I don't know what was said around that
because I wasn't in the whole of the meeting.
Q. And then it says:
"The upgraded system was tested and has the full
support of the NFSP."
It is true, as far as we can tell from the
documents, that NFSP was still supportive, but they had
actually raised concerns about it, hadn't they?
A. Yes.
Q. We saw that on page 4 of {F/614}. So that doesn't give
the complete picture to the MPs either if that's what
was said?
A. If that's what was said, because I wasn't party to that
conversation.
Q. Let's look please now at {F/658} please. It is the
functional report operations, June 2010, and on page 1
you can see Horizon Online:
"Successful completion to pilot of new
Horizon Online migration package.
"Horizon Online high volume pilot successfully
recommenced."
So what had happened there was that the halt that
had been placed on it had been lifted so it could
recommence, is that fair?
A. Yes.
Q. And this is something that you must have known about at
this time, is that fair? You know the --
A. Sorry, I don't recall ...
Q. No? You didn't know that the pilot had been stopped and
then recommenced?
A. I don't recall that it had actually been stopped and
recommenced, no.
Q. Let's look on page 2 please {F/658/2}:
"Horizon Online losses: over the last month a small
number of branches have raised concerns in regard to
system integrity and the creation of losses. So far no
evidence of system integrity issues has been found."
Were you aware that branches were raising system
integrity issues at this time?
A. No, I don't recall any information flowing out of that.
Q. Let's look please at {F/657} which is the network
functional report, June 2010 and if we look at page 3
please {F/657/3}, Horizon Online, we've got:
"High volume pilot resumed, 100 Crowns migrated with
further 170 Crowns planned this week.
"Ongoing delay to the programme impacting on
resource available to deliver migration support.
Support team continually reducing as people leave on VR
terms ..."
That's voluntary redundancy, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. So the support team was reducing because of voluntary
redundancies, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. "Initiating contingencies (eg more subpostmasters) but
to deliver the roll-out as planned we will now refuse
any further requests for people to leave the team to
take up roles in POL."
So that was one facet of provision of support to
SPMs who were affected by some of these issues, yes?
A. Yes.
Q. And if we go forward please to {F/708} this is a period
12 09/10 sales report. What is period 12? Just to
orientate ourselves by date?
A. That would be March.
Q. That would be March?
A. Yes.
Q. Of 2010?
A. We run April to March in our periods, yes.
Q. April to March, okay. So March 2010 it looks as if
we're in. And if we can go please to page 8 of that
document {F/708/8}:
"Horizon migration - a number of issues have
occurred with the data centre which have impacted [or]
have affected live service to all Horizon Online
branches. Following on from this a decision has now
been made to extend the duration of the pilot period to
allow for further testing to be undertaken on the
system. As a consequence the planned date for the full
roll-out schedule to commence has now been postponed
until satisfactory progress has been made in achieving
stability of branches within the pilot."
Did you have any visibility of this at the time? If
you didn't I can take it even more swiftly.
A. I must have had some but I can't recall to be honest.
Q. You can't recall. Did you look at any of this history
to --
A. No, no.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: To what?
MR GREEN: In order to give the description you give in your
witness statement?
A. Sorry, that's what I understood.
Q. That's what you understood?
A. Yes and the answer was no.
Q. I will take it a little bit more quickly then. If you
just go forward all the way to {F/1402}. This is an
extract from "Lessons Learned log" and under the area
"Audits" at 4.1 we can see certain complaints about
audits and so forth:
"Existing branch discrepancies not discovered during
audit of branch".
And so forth. And "Rationale for change:
"Postmasters perceive a lack of knowledge of person
conducting branch audit.
"POL needs to be confident that colleagues
performing audits are competent and there is confidence
across the network.
"POL need to be able to have clear sight of
losses/gains throughout the network."
Is this a document you are familiar with?
A. Yes.
Q. It is from 11 November 2015. It has your name at the
bottom left-hand corner, hasn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Were you the author of the document?
A. Yes.
Q. You were?
A. Yes.
Q. And what was the purpose of this document?
A. So the purpose was to look at any areas that I thought
we could improve. So at this time -- so we had been --
so we had -- branch support programme had been running,
we had done the initial complaint to the mediation
scheme and we had some business as usual areas that we
were investigating, some issues as well, so what I took
the opportunity to do then was look at what I believed
were enhancements/improvements that we could make to how
we operated to better support postmasters.
Q. And let's just identify the column headings. The
left-hand column is area, the second column is "Issue
identified", the third column is "Rationale for change"
and the fourth column is "Consideration for
Post Office"?
A. Yes.
Q. If we go forward please to page 5 {F/1402/5}, 9.2:
"Failure to be open and honest when issues arise eg
roll out of Horizon, HNGx migration issues/issues
affecting few branches no the seemingly publicised."
A. Yes.
Q. That was something you were specifically aware of,
wasn't it?
A. So that was out of -- there were some cases that we had
investigated as part of the mediation scheme.
Q. So you knew that there had been an issue about failing
to be open and honest during both the roll-out of
Horizon itself and the migration to HNGx which is
Horizon Online, yes?
A. Yes. But it was from a very limited source, it was just
from what I had investigated as part of this.
Q. So in your investigations you didn't look at any of the
sorts of documents that I have been showing you?
A. No.
Q. And do you accept that they might have helped to inform
you as to the extent to which those complaints were
justified?
A. Yes.
Q. If you had looked into it?
A. Yes.
Q. And the next box across says:
"Need to understand and action learnings from
Horizon, HNGx roll-out ..."
We can't see what that says. Without saying
anything that's privileged, what is the point you are
making there, in as far as you are able to tell
the court?
A. Sorry, in which part, the middle bit?
Q. No, the top bit, where you say "Need to understand and
action learnings from Horizon, HNGx roll-out ..."
A. So what I was trying to say was a broad -- a broad
concept really of as we do things across the business
then we should always look to see what lessons we could
take from whatever we do, in some cases they could be
very small things and in other cases they could be
larger things and this was a document then that I was
handing over into the business as usual environment as
a lessons learned, so "These are what we have observed
and these are the things that we would suggest", which
is why it said "for Post Office consideration".
Q. Because you go on in the bottom of that box to say:
"Adopting a mindset of that no hidden agenda/no
'skeletons in cupboard' will demonstrate that lessons
have been learned from Horizon, HNGx ... and business
shows its willingness to change."
A. Yes.
Q. You felt that would be an important change, didn't you,
and a helpful one?
A. Yes.
Q. What's proposed to do in the right-hand box is:
"Use standard communications in branch to reinforce
consistent message to customers and stakeholders."
And:
"Engage champions of POL and stakeholders throughout
the process of change."
That didn't actually specify any particular measures
for openness or transparency, did it?
A. No. No, that was quite broad. I mean so these were say
areas of consideration, they weren't really specific.
In some cases I would have been more specific, in others
I was being quite broad. What I meant by that were
things around -- so the branch user forum, for instance,
is actually bringing in postmasters and people from
within the business to take their B1 input and to
share -- to get their insight into things. That was in
a broad sense.
Q. Do you know what happened to that proposal? What action
was taken, if any, to implement what you had suggested?
A. I don't -- I don't know what happened to that one.
Q. Is there any evidence that you are aware of something
actually happening?
A. With branch user forum, yes, things did happen, as you
have seen and that was a very, very open forum and that
was used to engage particularly product managers or any
changes that were happening to the network would come to
the branch user forum and share in confidence a very
early view and take input and that kind of fed through
in terms of the new technology. IBM we were talking to
at the time in the front office and also the hardware
swap out that we did later on as well. Those are the
kind of things.
So some of it did happen, but I can't say I have
tracked that through.
Q. Is it fair to say in the branch user forum, when we
actually look at the branch user forum logs a lot of
that is actually feedback from SPMs to Post Office,
rather than Post Office saying "Look, we're aware that
this has gone wrong and so" --
A. It changed actually. So when it was first set up it
very much was that, so it was taking a lot of input from
postmasters and there was a Crown VM there as well, an
ABM, so it was across the business. It was a lot of
taking input and then it changed. As it got more --
I suppose as everybody got more comfortable and we
addressed some small areas and some quick wins in that,
it changed then to being seen as the forum to come to
get input to things like, you know, the new hardware,
the keyboard, the layout of the keys, for instance, on
the keyboard, even down to that basic level around what
that layout should look like in terms of the operation,
but other things as well.
Q. So sort of just looking at a practical point on that is
if you have buttons very close together to each other
which can easily be confused, that tends to increase the
risk of miskeys, doesn't it?
A. No, what it was on this -- there were two or three
keyboards that were being considered, size, shape, and
what we were asking -- you know, postmasters in the
forum, the users, "From how you operate the system,
which keyboard suits you better around the functionality
of easy of operation?"
Q. You mean a normal keyboard --
A. Yes.
Q. -- not how it is presented on the Horizon scene?
A. This was about the hardware, which was --
Q. Not the touch screen?
A. So that would be the software. This was about the
hardware.
Q. Okay. Let's briefly turn, if we may --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Now, Mr Green, I am going to suggest you
stop now.
MR GREEN: I will.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: We've got a number of matters to deal
with.
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: This is going to take about ten minutes.
You are very welcome to stay in the witness box if you
would like to, but you don't have to. You are still
going to be giving evidence tomorrow so please don't
discuss the case.
A. Of course.
Housekeeping
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I have some items and then we will come
back to some of the other items.
Mr De Garr Robinson, I am going to ask you to do
a task please, which is a redaction review. I have been
noting the different documents that have been redacted
and it seems to me that some of them are crying out for
a review by leading counsel of the basis on which they
have been redacted. I will just go through the list.
There is F/1549, F/1225, F/1664, F/610, F/639, F/658,
F/657, F/708 and F/1402.
I'm obviously not going to impose a time on you and
perhaps tomorrow you could just give me an update as to
how long you think it might take you. It might be
necessary to recall witnesses, hopefully it won't be,
but in the first instance I'd like you to review those
reactions please.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, yes, so it is F/1549, F/1664,
F/1225, F/610, F/639, F/658, F/657 and F/1402.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And there was F/708 as well.
The first couple appeared I think probably at the
beginning of the afternoon, the last half a dozen have
all been within the last 25 minutes.
That's the first point. The second point is --
I mean simply as an example, Mr De Garr Robinson, to
explain, F/708 is the monthly sales report
for March 2012. It has got quite a few redactions in
it. All of those I'm asking for a specific reason
I just think they are -- it is sensible to have it
reviewed.
Secondly, there's the outstanding point relating to
7/8/9 May which I mentioned at the end of last week. Do
any of you have any issues with it being the Tuesday and
Wednesday rather than --
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I have no issues with the 7th or the
8th.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I didn't think you would have. Thank
you very much. Mr Green?
MR GREEN: My Lord, one member of our team can't do the 7th
at all and it is not easy for the rest of us but we can
do it.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, 7th and 8th then, I'm afraid.
It is going to have to be.
MR GREEN: I understand.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, that's true of both -- I have
similar issues but ...
MR JUSTICE FRASER: As far as I'm concerned, unless it was
physically impossible it's going to be the Tuesday and
Wednesday, so it's going to be the 7th and 8th.
MR GREEN: We understand.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will keep -- because I'm in an
indulgent mood I will keep the time for your lodging
your closings as it was before. So you won't lose
a day.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm afraid I have forgotten when our
closings are due.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I believe it was -- well, Mr Green is
about to tell me when it was. Do you remember when it
was?
MR GREEN: I've got it I think in a different notebook.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I think your junior behind you is trying
to ...
MR GREEN: My Lord, I think your Lordship had a day in mind.
I'm not sure we actually crystallised what it was.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I don't remember a day being actually
specified.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Well, then, that's my fault and
I apologise.
MR GREEN: It may be ours.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will give you until noon on the Friday
before.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: That's very kind of your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Because I have taken a working day off
you, so that's up to me. And the Monday is in any case
a bank holiday but that's not a problem from my point of
view. So noon on the Friday before, which I think is
3 May.
Right, well, that -- just give me one second. Are
we having an opposed application at 10 o'clock tomorrow
for a third party disclosure order against Royal Mail?
MR GREEN: My Lord, I was expecting that Mr Warwick would be
coming over to do that at 10 o'clock.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That's why I'm asking.
MR GREEN: Precisely.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I don't have the witness statement that
you issued in respect -- I don't need it this minute but
if you have got one --
MR GREEN: We've got a copy just in case --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Right, hand that up please.
MR GREEN: I'm afraid it has not been hole-punched.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: That doesn't matter.
MR GREEN: My Lord, I have literally just been passed
a yellow sticker saying "Some E&Y audits have arrived".
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, well, you can update me
tomorrow, or through my clerk later on.
MR GREEN: I'm most grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But these are the papers for tomorrow at
10 o'clock?
MR GREEN: My Lord, they are.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Do you know -- we will just have to take
that as and when.
MR GREEN: If we find out anything this afternoon we will
let your learned clerk now and then --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right, that's excellent.
That's all my housekeeping.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, I have one piece of
housekeeping which is your Lordship asked for an order
to be prepared reflecting what your Lordship indicated
this morning about the witness statement.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes please.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: Could I hand this up and then I will
hand it to my learned friend.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Thank you very much indeed.
(Pause).
I have just signed that -- well, I have read it,
checked it, signed it. I will give it to my clerk and
it will be sealed by the QB.
So no more housekeeping?
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: My Lord, there is one other matter
which is one of my witnesses, Mr Membery. Your Lordship
may recall from the PTR that he has a serious illness
and your Lordship may recall that we indicated that he
would be having tests in hospital this week and we would
do our best to ensure that it was possible. My Lord, he
is currently due to be giving evidence on Wednesday.
The difficulty is he is in hospital today for tests --
this is to do with prostate cancer and --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: There is no need to go into -- you don't
have to go into details.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: But he has been told that he needs to
attend for further tests tomorrow and Wednesday.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: And at the moment he is not sure
whether he will be needed on Thursday as well.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: I will tell you what we should do with
him, there is flexibility in the timetable next week,
without -- I don't want that gentleman to feel under any
pressure at all.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Take instructions, if with some sensible
interleaving or creating of what I imagine based on the
length of his witness statement is not going to be more
than half a day at the most if not probably an hour with
Mr Green, that could be fitted in either the week we're
not sitting, or if necessary some other time. But
I don't want him to feel under pressure to come here if
he is actually in hospital at the moment.
MR DE GARR ROBINSON: I'm very grateful to your Lordship.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: We will deal with that creatively.
Mr Green, anything from you?
MR GREEN: My Lord, the only thing that occurred to me, just
thinking about the sticker that has just arrived --
MR JUSTICE FRASER: The sticker?
MR GREEN: Sorry, the E&Y audits that apparently some have
now been received. Would your Lordship be amenable to
us requesting, if appropriate, that what's due to be
heard tomorrow morning at 10 might be postponed until
the following morning at 10 if it looks as if we are
likely to have greater clarity on it?
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Yes, but you will have to take relevant
steps with Royal Mail and whoever they have
instructed --
MR GREEN: My Lord, of course.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: And you will have to notify the court.
MR GREEN: It may be easier just to come at 10 tomorrow and
get it clear.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Let's put it this way: I'm here anyway
from quite a lot earlier than 10 so it is not a problem
for me to come down at 10 and go back upstairs and I'm
flexible. But you have my clerk's email address so it
is not an issue. If you would rather do it on
Wednesday -- well, just see how the land lies and just
decide.
MR GREEN: I'm grateful.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: But if it is to be moved from the date
in the order I made on Friday, you will have to notify
Royal Mail of that.
MR GREEN: My Lord, we would of course do that.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: What I don't want is Royal Mail coming
at very short notice and the claimants not being here.
MR GREEN: Of course.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: All right. Is that everything?
MR GREEN: My Lord, yes.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: Thank you all very much.
Actually there is one point I should add to
everyone. If there is an opposed application tomorrow
at 10 o'clock, Mrs van den Bogerd, there is an outside
chance that we might not be ready to resume your
evidence bang on 10.30.
A. Okay.
MR JUSTICE FRASER: So please don't be concerned about that.
If you turn up and you look through the window and you
see -- I mean it will be open to the public, but you
probably won't want to come in given you will be giving
your evidence. If we're not able to start bang on 10.30
with you then I will probably start at say quarter to
11, but if the Royal Mail do come tomorrow, I imagine it
won't take a full 30 minutes, so it probably won't
arise, but just to tip you off basically, so you don't
worry that we have started without you.
Right, so, 10 o'clock for you, 10.30 potentially
10.45 for the Post Office, unless you want to sit in on
the Royal Mail. Thank you all very much.
(4.32 pm)
(The court adjourned until 10.00 am on Tuesday,
19 March 2019)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)