Post Office scandal

[roadster]

I didn't realize at the time but back in the early two thousands I was a minor victim of Post Office Ltd. myself. At the time they were the obvious choice as internet service provider if they already provided telephone services and I paid their quarterly bills by cheque with regularity. Unexpectedly they sent my a threatening letter saying I was about to be cut-off because I hadn't paid the bill. I immediately sent them a copy off my bank statement showing the cheque had been cleared through as usual within about a week of receiving the bill. This wasn't good enough even though I had been a customer for many years and always paid immediately and without delay. They insisted that I obtain the cleared cheque from my bank and send that to them as well!

At the time I was astonished that far from receiving an apology they sent me a grudging letter that, far from acknowledging their mistake, they implied I was somehow at fault and they were crediting my account as a "goodwill gesture". Now I know what a mess they were in it all makes sense and I was just lucky that the amount in question was so small that it would not have been worth their while to take matters further.

Needless to say I changed service provider at the first opportunity.

I could write pages about what happens when managers who don't understand IT or computers hive off responsibility to contractors but I won't bore you with that!

[Potter]

I’ve got a great story about how my mortgage company suddenly decided one day that I didn’t have a mortgage with them and for months any attempt to pay it just hit a dead end.

In the end they got very frustrated with me because I kept pestering them over an imaginary mortgage that they were convinced I’d made up.

It went on for about six months. Each time I’d speak to a different person.

Then they somehow realised that I did actually have a mortgage and I’d now missed about six payments. They gave me something like five working days to settle in full or they’d take me to court….and when I called back to explain they accused me of making the whole thing up as a ploy to avoid my mortgage payments.

The bank? Northern Rock.

[Newey]

So Paula Vennells, ex PO CEO, is in the hot seat at the inquiry today and surprise surprise she "cannot remember" didn't read the letter or email and this is a copy and paste from the inquiry.

Counsel to the Inquiry Jason Beer now returns to Vennells’s witness statement. He says she has often said she doesn’t recall matters that could potentially be damaging to the Post Office, but “has no problem” remembering things that attribute blame to others.

Why do you tend to remember things that diminish your blameworthiness, Beer asks Vennells.

Why/how do these people get such a huge salary with massive bonus, she should be made to pay back the bonuses after she is released from jail.

[Mr. Dazzle]

I’ve got a great story about how my mortgage company suddenly decided one day that I didn’t have a mortgage with them and for months any attempt to pay it just hit a dead end.

In the end they got very frustrated with me because I kept pestering them over an imaginary mortgage that they were convinced I’d made up.

It went on for about six months. Each time I’d speak to a different person.

Then they somehow realised that I did actually have a mortgage and I’d now missed about six payments. They gave me something like five working days to settle in full or they’d take me to court….and when I called back to explain they accused me of making the whole thing up as a ploy to avoid my mortgage payments.

The bank? Northern Rock.

I do sometimes wonder if you should record calls like this to the bank. So far as I know its perfectly legal, so long as you tell them at the start, like they do with you.

[Count Steer]

I’ve got a great story about how my mortgage company suddenly decided one day that I didn’t have a mortgage with them and for months any attempt to pay it just hit a dead end.

In the end they got very frustrated with me because I kept pestering them over an imaginary mortgage that they were convinced I’d made up.

It went on for about six months. Each time I’d speak to a different person.

Then they somehow realised that I did actually have a mortgage and I’d now missed about six payments. They gave me something like five working days to settle in full or they’d take me to court….and when I called back to explain they accused me of making the whole thing up as a ploy to avoid my mortgage payments.

The bank? Northern Rock.

I do sometimes wonder if you should record calls like this to the bank. So far as I know its perfectly legal, so long as you tell them at the start, like they do with you.

Correct.

(I have the technology with a house phone plumbed into the PC. Haven't needed to use it for banking purposes...yet ).

[Potter]

I do sometimes wonder if you should record calls like this to the bank. So far as I know its perfectly legal, so long as you tell them at the start, like they do with you.

I doubt it would have done much good, they went bust less than a year later, I have a feeling that their shocking internal management was as much to blame as their reckless finance strategy.

After many months of them repeatedly assuring me that I didn't have a mortgage with them, I started to hope that they might have screwed up and permanently closed it, but it turned out that they'd transferred my mortgage internally to another department/cost centre/whatever and it had got stuck in the process - until it received a nudge - and then they wanted six months payments there and then or they'd instigate action against me.

Somewhere there would have been a CEO ultimately responsible, but there would have been dozens of other people equally as guilty of doing a terrible job. The CEO takes the big salary and takes the fall when dozens/hundreds/thousands of employees make a hash of something, and that's why they get paid so much, they cannot possibly know and remember each and every data point that passes through the company, it's all flying past so quickly in a large organisation that a lot just wizzes on by.
So they get paid enough to be the one to take the hit, you can't do everyone, so you pick out the top guys and do them if/when it all goes wrong.

[Bike Breaker]

I agree with Potter. While a task can be delegated to a subordinate who becomes responsible and accountable for carrying it out, but their superior cannot delegate their own responsibility and accountability for the completion of the task. It's a form of strict liability. Not knowing that the task hasn't been completed is no defence. It's funny how many people at the top don't appear to know these things.

In my working days in the NHS, my direct line manager threatened my workmate and me that "heads will roll and it won't be mine" if a tender wasn't sent out to contractors the next day. I thought, if my head was going to roll, so would everyone's above me in the chain of command, right up to the CEO. I was going on holiday in 2 days time so the two of us worked late (no change there, then) and did as we were told. Both of us were safe from head-rolling because we had finished our task in accordance with the manager's order.

When I returned I asked my workmate if the contractors had submitted their prices. Er, no, because our manager hadn't obtained approval from the department's director to send them out, so they had been recalled. His head didn't roll.

[Mussels]

So Paula Vennels buried the buried the report on false evidence because her PR manager told her it wouldn't look good.
I'd like to know how complicit the CPS was in this, did they know how ropey the evidence they were using was?

[Yorick]

So Paula Vennels buried the buried the report on false evidence because her PR manager told her it wouldn't look good.
I'd like to know how complicit the CPS was in this, did they know how ropey the evidence they were using was?

Were the CPS involved ? IIRC, the PO were judge, jury & executioner

[Mussels]

So Paula Vennels buried the buried the report on false evidence because her PR manager told her it wouldn't look good.
I'd like to know how complicit the CPS was in this, did they know how ropey the evidence they were using was?

Were the CPS involved ? IIRC, the PO were judge, jury & executioner

They didn't do as many of the prosecutions but there were a few, it seems unclear how many relied on Horizon claims.

[Yambo]

When the enquiry is all done and dusted Paula Vennells (and a fair few others) should be prosecuted - there's got to be something they can do her for (she lied to MPs but I don't know if she committed perjury).

However, here's a prediction: As soon as she is charged with whatever, she'll develop dementia or Alzheimers only to make a remarkable recovery when the CPS decide she's not well enough to stand trial.