Almost half of sub-postmasters remain dissatisfied with the Post Office’s controversial Horizon IT system, while the vast majority have experienced an issue with the system in the last year.
The concerning findings come from a major YouGov poll of sub-postmasters, commissioned by retired High Court judge Sir Wyn Williams. He is leading the public inquiry into the Horizon IT scandal, which saw the Post Office pursue wrongful convictions against hundreds of its sub-postmasters, blaming them for discrepancies in accounting which later proved to have been caused by bugs in the IT system.
The surveys were carried out ahead of the inquiry resuming for its seventh phase this week. It aims to look at the current culture at the Post Office and how it has changed in light of the scandal. The latest phase is set to run for almost two months and will include hearings from current and former Post Office bosses, including CEO Nick Read, who is due to appear for three days from 9-11 October. Read announced last week that he is stepping down from the role and will leave the business in March.
In all, 92% of those responding to the survey had experienced problems with the Horizon system in the last year. The most common of the these were screen freezes (70%) and loss of connection (68%). However more worryingly, 57% said they had experienced unexplained discrepancies, while 19% said they had seen unexplained transactions, 14% reported missing transactions, and 10% reported replicated transactions.
Of the 49% of sub-postmasters expressing their dissatisfaction with the Horizon system, one in four were “very dissatisfied”. Just 25% of the respondents expressed satisfaction with the system.
A second YouGov survey covered the Horizon shortfall compensation scheme. The results of this survey followed a similar pattern, with just under half (49%) expressing dissatisfaction with the scheme and 47% finding it hard to understand. Almost four in five (78%) reported they had not received contact from a case assessor, compared to just 10% that had been contacted.
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