 It is the late 1990s and the UK's post office network is rolling out a new accounting and EPOS software. It had come from an earlier project that aimed at improving efficiency in the way that unemployment and benefit payments are made. This was in an effort to stop some £150 million in fraudulent benefit claims per year. After a number of years of overspend and overrunning schedules, the new software has been scaled back to working as a transaction and accounting software solution. What each post office and sub post office isn't aware of is that the software is buggy and unreliable. So much so, but it will result in millions of pounds magically becoming unaccounted for, which will result in ruin and conviction of hundreds of post office workers. Arguably becoming one of the worst software glitches in history, not only will it cost livelihoods and freedom, but in some tragic cases, even lives. Today we're going to be looking at the post office horizon software scandal. My name is John and welcome to Plainly Difficult. Not that kind of gyro. Okay, so today we will start off with touching on a little bit of unique UK history, and that is of benefits and unemployment payments and its unique slang term. This is the word gyro and it's not a Greek wrap, a tasty, tasty, delicious wrap, but it's a cheque from the British government to someone who is unemployed. One of the places that would cash in this cheque for you was traditionally at the post office. The paper based system by the 1990s was considered inefficient and vulnerable to fraud. The symbiotic relationship of the gyro cheque and the post office counter service had accounted for nearly one third of post office counters business. As such, the government deemed the payment of dull money via the post office an essential part of the network's survival. So a new system was devised by the post office counters and the Department for Social Security to automate the payments of benefits via the use of an electronic payment card. This would still make use of the counter service at post offices. So to cut a long story short, the DSS and post office put out to tender the demands for a new software and five companies were shortlisted. BT, Syntegra, Cardlink, EDS, IBM and Pathway, the latter of which was a subsidiary of International Computers Limited, a company owned by Fujitsu. The winning company was Pathway and after many years of trouble development, the software was behind schedule by 1998. During testing, errors were being detected but development continued and the project just went out of control. The result was in May 1999 the cancellation of the benefits card's payment system, instead leaving a point of sale system devoid of the original plan of sorting out gyros and no it is not that really really tasty food. However, although scaled back, issues with software now named Horizon kept on popping up during testing. For example, issues with communication with a point of sale side of Horizon and the transaction information processing system used by the post office were reported. During its initial rollout, numerous complaints from post offices to post office counter support services came in explaining that their weekly balance was different to their sales amount. A lot of this was chalked up to improper training from Horizon support officers and post office staff. ICL Pathway would be forced to agree to correct some of these issues in late 1999. However, the software continued to be rolled out in its buggy state over the next few years to over 13,000 branches by 2001. Really issues with the software were well known within ICL Pathway and Fujitsu. However, they just wanted that sweet sweet money that completing the rollout would bring in. Reportedly over 1 billion pounds to install. Quickly I should explain how the post office branch counters network was operated. So if you walk into a post office, there's a 90% chance that it's being run by a private company, usually a self-employed sole trader. You see many are set up as news agents, with the post office element added on. This system makes the owner, operators of the post office counters, a sub postmaster. They aren't directly employed by the post office and thus don't have employment contracts. Instead, they have a contract to operate the post office on the company's behalf. This meant that in many cases, these people had invested all of their money into their business. And any shortfalls in reported earnings to actual earnings would have to be covered by the shop owners themselves. However, they had no choice in which software they could use and were a bit of a captive customer. Kind of bit like how a franchise restaurant works. Bearing that in mind, if your point of sale software is defective in reporting correct numbers, who do you think is left holding the bag? Well, you guessed correctly, the sub postmaster. So as part of the rollout, training was to be provided by ICL Pathway. It would later come out that it wasn't the best training, which is hardly a surprise. So just on the accounting side of Horizon, such as accounts balancing, the course lasted one and a half days for managers and just one day for counter staff. This wasn't enough, especially for many sub postmasters, as this was the first computer system they had ever used. For context, it was thought that in the 1990s, as said in the official Horizon Inquiry, in 1998, it was estimated that only 31 to 33% of UK adults had a personal computer at home. The Horizon software, due to its bugs, was very particular to the way data had to be entered, leaving it open to accidental under or over-reporting, which when in the context of a potentially illiterate postmaster that hasn't been trained properly, it was a recipe for disaster. This video is proudly sponsored by Private Internet Access. So first of all, what is a VPN? Well, a virtual private network is an app that hides your IP address and safeguards your internet connection through an encrypted tunnel. This way it shields your digital life from the eyes of those who are looking to exploit your private information. Using an internet without PIA is like having a castle with no gate. It pretty much makes the walls pointless. So I do a lot of video research whilst I'm out and about, enjoying a coffee or on the train. 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So to check out PIA, go to www.piavpn.com slash plainly difficult to get 83% off private internet access with four months free. So now back to the video, shortfalls and fraud. So almost as soon as the software was running, complaints came into the post office helpline. Many shortfalls were being reported. For many subpostmasters, this was the first time they'd experienced this in their careers. And this all happened within just a few weeks of horizon being installed. The post office in each case of shortfall backed the complaining subpostmaster that it was their fault, and they would need to cover any loss personally. Covince that the new software was uncovering vast amounts of fraud, the post office would keep applying pressure on their subpostmasters. For some, only a few hundred quid was short, but others shortfalls of thousands were experienced. Eventually the contracts of some subpostmasters were terminated, dumping a massive bill and no way to make the money back. But this was just the tip of the scandalous iceberg. You see, having a shortfall on a company's account that can't be well accounted for, opens up the risk of an accusation of fraud, false accounting and ultimately theft. All of which could get you in front of a judge on a criminal charge. And that is exactly what would happen for the most unlucky in the scandal, court conviction and prison awaited. Over a 16 year period, an estimated 900 prosecutions were brought against post office staff and subpostmasters. 700 of which were privately prosecuted by the post office itself, which led to hundreds of criminal convictions for Frefton Ford. During many criminal cases, evidence was used directly from the horizon software and it was just taken as gospel. Some were even bullied into entering a guilty plea at court to avoid prison time, so hundreds got criminal convictions which ruined careers, families, pride and freedom. And some were even taken in for custodial sentences, all because of this dodgy software. And at least four people are known to have taken their own lives due to the stress of the scandal. To add even more salt into the wound, many would be forced into bankruptcy. Don't forget, but during this time the post office and Fujitsu were actually aware of issues with the software. So let's have a look at some of the reported glitches. Bugs. So what was going wrong? Well it seems that there was actually a wide number of glitches, some still not made public as according to the Guardian newspaper. Each bug was named after the first place it was reported. Two of which, which were reported in the same Guardian article, was the Dow Mellington bug, in which data entry could cause a system freeze and any push of the enter button would increase the total. So say if an operator put in a payment of £1,000 and the system freezes. Usually, well most people, would just tap the enter button a few times to jolly along the computer. But, with this glitch, each press would increase the amount by the original £1,000. So hey presto, tapping the button, say 4 times, increased the amount by £4,000. Now your books are out by a significant amount of money. Another glitch mentioned in the Guardian article was the calendar square bug, where any entered amount would be duplicated on the back end. Other times, honest errors of data entry couldn't even be edited. This meant that general human errors in data entry were stuck in the system forever. On top of that, data transfer could cause financial discrepancies. But it didn't end there. Although postal and sub postal staff couldn't actually edit their totals, Fujitsu in the back end could and without the knowledge of post office staff. On top of that, updates to the software could be done again behind sub post masters and post office staff backs, which again could interfere with the financial totals, creating even more potential for shortfalls. The scandal was suppressed for the first few years of the new century, but eventually the tide would change. The scandal unearthed. So, the beginnings of the scandal becoming public knowledge began with this guy, Alan Bates. He was a sub post master in Craigidon, London though, between March 1998 until November 2003 when his contract was terminated. He was experiencing IT from a previous career and Bates had become suspicious of the software that had ruined his life. He took his theory and the evidence he had gathered from his own post office and submitted it to computer weekly magazine in 2004. This spark would set the fire that would burn away the curtain the post office had built around the scandal. By 2009 computer weekly had gathered enough evidence, but it was confident to print an article exposing the massive balls up. Eventually, Horizon was legally declared unreliable in Bates and others versus the post office limited in 2018, of which 550 sub post masters and other staff were involved as claimants against the post office limited. I've got to say Bates is actually a real legend. He refused an OBE when offered saying it would have been a slap in the face to the rest of the group because Paula Venilis, the CEO for many years at post office, received a CBE for her services to post office. Well, what service has she actually done? So making things right has been a long journey that is still ongoing. Numerous cases and appeals were brought over the following years, including R, the Christopher, Trousdale and others of December 2020, Hamilton and others and post office limited in April 2021 and Felstead and others and post office limited in April 2021, in which convictions were thankfully quashed upon appeal. But many more convictions are still on people's criminal records, especially on cases where guilty plea was entered. Compensation has been offered, but in my opinion, it is nowhere near what is needed. As noted in post office and horizon compensation, the interim report. At the end of a long running series of civil cases, the post office agreed to settle with 555 claimants paying 57.75 million in damages. However, of this settlement, 46 million was paid out in legal fees. On the 26th of February 2020, Prime Minister at the time, Boris Johnson, committed to an independent inquiry into the scandal, which is still currently ongoing. At the time of writing this script in January 2024, only 95 convictions have been overturned. Sadly, no one at the post office responsible for the software rollout and bullying of sub-postmasters have been criminally charged themselves. At least yet. So this story is still ongoing, so watch this space. If you'd like to read more in depth, summary of the scandal, look into the official inquiry website, the brilliant computer weekly article or the private eye special report. So, scale time. It's going to have to be a four or a five, because there was a human cost in lives, as well as just livelihoods. And this is what I've got on the bingo card. Do you agree? Let me know in the comments below. I'd like to say thank you to PIA for sponsoring this video. This is a plainly foot production. All videos on the channel are created by Commons Attribution Shareright Licensed. Plainly Foot Videos produced by me, John, in the currently wet and windy corner of southern London, UK. 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