Electronic mail from 1999 reveals Submit Workplace ECCO+ system crash issues
An e mail from 1999 reveals a system utilized in a whole lot of Submit Workplace branches within the Nineteen Nineties, often known as ECCO+, skilled freezing which may have triggered misplaced transactions.
A former Submit Workplace supervisor instructed Laptop Weekly that when these freezes occurred, the system misplaced very important transaction data when it was rebooted as a result of its incapacity to revert again to its earlier state.
Details about ECCO+, its errors and results on customers is difficult to return by, however the occasions of the Submit Workplace scandal make it important that the ECCO+ system points and the consequences on department employees and subpostmasters are examined.
The e-mail, printed by the Submit Workplace Horizon public inquiry and titled “system freezes”, was despatched between Submit Workplace employees in 1999 in the course of the roll-out of the ill-fated Horizon system in hundreds of branches.
On the time, system freezes have been being skilled with the Fujitsu/ICL Horizon software program because it was being rolled out throughout the Submit Workplace department community. In keeping with the e-mail, employees on the system’s provider wished to “put together a line” to minimize these points by describing them as being at a stage to be anticipated with a computer-based system. The e-mail included a request for knowledge on system freezes skilled by customers of ECCO+ to permit a comparability with the “potential high-severity acceptance incidents” being skilled with Horizon.
Within the e mail, a Submit Workplace government wrote: “As you in all probability know, one of many potential high-severity acceptance incidents nonetheless excellent [with Horizon] pertains to the variety of instances that the system freezes and must be re-booted earlier than it may be used once more. [Fujitsu/ICL] appear to be getting ready a line on this that the issue is just on the stage that we must always have anticipated from a computer-based system and is in keeping with business norms. We have to be able to refute this.
“In parallel, it could assist our case if we may present that we don’t have this stage of incident with our present techniques,” it mentioned. The e-mail additionally requested “efficiency stats or assist desk analyses” for different techniques together with ECCO+.
ECCO+ was utilized in Crown branches within the 1990, with some subpostmasters who took over crown branches having additionally used it. There may have been greater than 600 branches transformed from Crown branches to sub–Submit Places of work, which used ECCO+ in some unspecified time in the future, based on the Nationwide Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP)
The ECCO+ knowledge revealed data for 3 months in 1999. From April to June that yr, there have been 56 calls to the helpdesk relating to ECCO+ system freezes.
Given there have been 6,305 terminals utilizing ECCO+ in whole, the quantity is small, however former Submit Workplace supervisor Rupert Lloyd Thomas instructed Laptop Weekly that the numbers “are in all probability simply the tip of the iceberg”.
He mentioned that when department employees known as for help, they have been in all probability instructed to reboot, which meant they in all probability rebooted once more with out calling the helpline the following time it occurred. With system freezes, account balancing issues would happen for ECCO+ customers as a result of the system had no method of robotically reverting to the final recognized good configuration, leading to misplaced transactions, he added.
Lloyd Thomas spent almost three many years on the Submit Workplace from the early Seventies and has detailed information of ECCO+.
“ECCO+ was chronically unreliable, it was an inexpensive and nasty system,” he mentioned. “I had loads to do with work attempting to get that system mounted. There was a disaster with it in 1996 and an investigation was commissioned. It was carried out by the Submit Workplace IT division and a report was produced. The gist of that report was that the system was faulty.”
Lloyd Thomas mentioned the investigation culminated in what was often known as the Kirk report in 1996: “They didn’t wish to do something, and I made such a fuss about it and mentioned, ‘We will’t have these individuals within the entrance line with a system that’s crashing in every single place’.”
He mentioned an IT government on the Submit Workplace produced the report which discovered there was a situation often known as sector slip, which occurred when the system went down and tried to get well.
Following the brand new proof and in mild of the Horizon scandal, the NFSP is asking for a “full investigation into ECCO+”.
Unheard tales
The struggles of customers of the Submit Workplace’s Horizon system are nicely documented, and those who suffered by the hands of faults in its Seize software program are being heard, however there’s a cohort of subpostmasters but to be correctly examined.
Calum Greenhow, CEO on the Nationwide Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP), mentioned: “The priority the NFSP has is it now seems that not solely did Horizon and Seize have errors, bugs and defects, the proof is rising {that a} precursor to Horizon, ECCO+, which may have been put in in round 640 Modified Sub-Places of work run by subpostmasters, had related issues that resulted in them having to refund Submit Workplace for losses that will haven’t been consumer error. As such, we’re calling on authorities to hold out a full investigation into ECCO+ in the identical style as they’ve with Horizon and Seize.”
Final yr, when considerations have been raised in regards to the ECCO+ system, the authorities mentioned it could look into them, with a DBT spokesperson confirming: “We’re trying into the ECCO+ system utilized in Submit Workplace branches and its potential impression on subpostmasters and department staff.”
Tales of monetary struggles skilled by subpostmasters, who inherited the system once they took over Submit Workplace-owned Crown branches, are coming to mild.
Not like the Submit Workplace’s Horizon and Seize techniques, which have been utilized in sub-Submit Workplace branches, ECCO+ was primarily utilized in Submit Workplace-owned Crown branches. However subpostmasters who took over former Crown branches suffered monetary difficulties after inheriting the Submit Workplace’s ECCO+ system.
Janette Armour was a subpostmaster in Scotland. From 1977, she labored in Crown branches and was promoted to the Submit Workplace headquarters in Glasgow, earlier than shopping for a sub-Submit Workplace department close to Glasgow, along with her husband.
They have been then requested if they might be concerned with taking up a Crown Workplace in East Kilbride, which they did in 1994. ECCO+ was used within the department, which had six counters.
“The system didn’t work correctly the primary day it was put in,” mentioned Armour.
She had labored manually in her earlier Submit Workplace department roles and acquired a day of coaching on ECCO+, which she described as “superb”.
Issues from the start
However shortfalls started nearly instantly. “Instantly, we started having losses each week,” Armour mentioned, including that she had not skilled issues like this earlier than. “We’d be there until midnight generally, going via every thing, double checking and operating the reviews.”
They have been shedding round £350 every week, mentioned Armour. “I instructed my space supervisor, and she or he simply appeared unconcerned about it.” However issues took a flip for the more severe when there was a £500 loss, main Armour to contact the Submit Workplace particular investigation department.
“They got here out and interviewed all of the employees, mentioned that two of the employees have been stealing and so they have been accused and so they walked out,” Armour mentioned, including that she is now attempting to contact the previous employees to inform them what has occurred. “I do know that being accused of stealing ruined one among their lives.”
She estimates that her husband and herself lined at the very least £16,000 value of shortfalls a yr, for 2 and a half years: “We misplaced every thing we had made promoting a earlier enterprise.”
This took its toll, and Armour and her husband have been ultimately suggested to promote their smaller Submit Workplace department. However, after shedding extra money, they needed to promote their former Crown department as nicely. On the final day on the department, it was revealed to Armour that even Submit Workplace employees knew ECCO+ was problematic.
“On the switch day, the audit staff got here out and had balanced £350 quick and the auditor mentioned to me ‘You’re balanced’ and I mentioned, ‘Effectively, no, we’re £350 quick’, and she or he mentioned, ‘Did nobody inform you that you could’t use the reviews from ECCO+ as a result of they don’t add up correctly?’”
Armour and her husband ultimately purchased one other department and used the Horizon system the place additionally they skilled issues. It took the couple greater than 10 years to repay money owed they’d constructed up due to issues at their department that used ECCO+. They’re a part of the Horizon Shortfall Compensation scheme however haven’t been permitted to make claims for losses skilled once they have been utilizing ECCO+.
Unanswered questions
Laptop Weekly requested the Submit Workplace what number of former Crown branches have been taken over by subpostmasters (franchised) between 1980 and 2000, and what number of of those branches continued to make use of ECCO+ software program after they have been taken over.
The Submit Workplace was additionally requested what number of prosecutions of subpostmasters who used ECCO+ it has instigated and the way could Crown department employees have been punished on account of unexplained losses in branches utilizing ECCO+.
The Submit Workplace didn’t reply the questions however recommended a freedom of data (FOI) request be submitted. Laptop Weekly submitted an FOI request and the Submit Workplace mentioned it was unable to reply due the request exceeding price limits.
The NFSP submitted a freedom of data request for the Kirk report and the difficulty of sector slip, however the Submit Workplace mentioned it may discover no proof of both.
“We now have carried out affordable and acceptable searches to our e mail repositories, SharePoint websites and Staff Chats for any point out of the ‘Kirk report’, ‘Jack Kirk’ and ‘sector slip’ or ‘ECCO+’, between 01 January 1990 to 31 December 1999. Nevertheless, these searches returned nil outcomes. We due to this fact affirm we don’t maintain the knowledge you might have requested.”
A Submit Workplace spokesperson instructed Laptop Weekly: “It’s regarding that ECCO/ECCO+, a system which was in use in some branches within the Nineteen Nineties, could have triggered accounting points. We now have been involved with the Division for Enterprise and Commerce, and there’s nonetheless very restricted data on ECCO/ECCO+, so it is vital that any points are raised to allow them to be correctly reviewed.
“We encourage anybody who believes they could have been affected by accounting issues linked to ECCO/ECCO+ to return ahead to the Division for Enterprise and Commerce, or, if they like, the NFSP.”
The Submit Workplace scandal was first uncovered by Laptop Weekly in 2009, revealing the tales of seven subpostmasters and the issues they suffered as a result of Horizon accounting software program, which led to essentially the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British historical past (see beneath timeline of Laptop Weekly articles in regards to the scandal since 2009).
