Former subpostmaster who suffered at the hands of the post office faulty Capture accounting program said the announced compensation scheme “discriminates” against claimants.
The scheme offers initial payments of £10,000 with a final bonus of up to £300,000 to sub-postmasters affected by Capture software flaws, with payments above the cap being made in “exceptional cases”.
Former Postmaster General Lee Bowerman, who lost his business due to Capture's shortcomings, accused the government of discriminating against Capture users compared to those affected by the Horizon system. “Where did they get the £300,000 figure from? It doesn't even touch on my losses,” he said.
Steve Marston, who attended the meeting with Postmaster General Blair McDougall along with Bowerman and other former postmasters, said “the announcement dropped like a lead balloon.”
He asked: “What are exceptional circumstances? The government should clarify this.”
Department of Business and Trade
Computer Weekly asked the Department of Business and Trade what exceptional circumstances were and a spokesman said the department would get in touch.
Marston was found guilty of financial crimes in 1997 as a result of unexplained shortfalls at his branch in Bury, Lancashire.
He was prosecuted for theft and falsifying accounts after an unexplained shortfall of almost £80,000. Marston said he never had a problem using a paper accounting system, but that changed when his branch, which he had run since 1973, began using the Capture system.
The Criminal Courts Review Commission (CCRC) is currently considering his appeal against the conviction, as well as about 30 other cases based on Capture. The compensation scheme is not available to people with criminal convictions, but they can appeal their conviction through the CCRC.
The Capture redress scheme will be tested on 150 claimants before being fully rolled out to all victims. The government believes up to 1,500 lawsuits will be filed.
Many Capture users suffered as did users of Horizon, the software that followed it.
Joe Hamilton, who was wrongly convicted due to flaws caused by Horizon's system, said: “Here we are again, trying to minimize payouts. The victims of the takeover are the same as the victims of Horizon. They lost businesses and homes just like us and suffered the same; the government should treat them the same when it comes to redress.”
DBT said: “…we have made it clear in our guidance to claimants that if the independent panel considers the case to be sufficiently compelling, then the panel has the power to award compensation in excess of that amount.”
Capture system controversy appeared in January 2024after the ITV drama Mr Bates v Post Office told the stories of subpostmasters affected by the Horizon system. That same month, Kevan Jones, then a Member of Parliament and now a member of the House of Lords, highlighted evidence of injustice caused by losses during capture.
While Horizon, introduced in 2000, was a large enterprise system used by all subpostmasters, Capture was floppy disk-based and was used by a couple thousand people in the mid-1990s.
But those who encountered unexplained shortcomings in the two different systems were treated equally. They were held responsible for shortcomings and had to make up for them. People were declared bankrupt, and some were prosecuted and sent to prison.
Compensation schemes
In September 2024, an independent investigation by forensic experts Kroll found that there was a “reasonable probability” Post Office Capture software caused accounting losses. But despite this, Capture users are not allowed to join existing compensation schemes aimed at Horizon victims, which in some cases have no cap on payout amounts.
Horizon compensation schemes have paid out more than £1.2 billion to more than 9,000 victims, according to the latest government figures.
McDougall said: “After more than two decades of fighting for justice, postmasters and their families will finally receive recognition and compensation for the lives and livelihoods that Capture destroyed.”
He thanked the victims who helped develop the scheme, but Marston said no one was shown the compensation claim form before the scheme was launched. “They prepared a statement form without actually consulting any of the victims themselves… I don't think that's very democratic or fair,” he said.
But bThe others, Marston and Bowerman, said they were not properly consulted. Bowerman said that “this came completely out of the blue for us.”
Last week Post Office awarded £2 million contract Search your own records for identifying information about Capture users and find evidence of unexplained deficiencies.
Computer weekly first exposed the Post Office scandal in 2009.revealing the stories of seven subpostmasters and the problems they faced due to Horizon accounting software.
Read: Everything you need to know about the Post Office scandal.
