Fujitsu employees 'dragged over coals' if they admitted issues with Post Office software | ITV News
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- čas přidán 31. 01. 2024
- A former employee at a Fujitsu call centre who dealt with queries from sub-postmasters about the Horizon system told ITV News that staff would have been "dragged over the coals" if they admitted the software had problems.
Nate Orrow worked at Fujitsu's Stevenage call centre for two years, between 2010 and 2012.
Speaking exclusively to ITV News, he said that when sub-postmasters were required to balance their accounts, the call centre would be "back to back for hours" with queries.
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The level of sheer wickedness of those responsible for knowingly sending innocent people to prison is difficult to comprehend.
The answer is simple: such people are sociopaths. Society's problem is that it permits sociopaths to be in positions of power.
Without stiff jail sentences to the bosses , this scandal will be repeated in a culture where the small people are punished for the mistakes of the rich and powerful.
The PO should not be deciding 'compensation' and they should not be contesting appeals against conviction, after all that has been exposed. The priority should be to restore/reimburse the moneys/assets that were stolen from the SPMs by the PO. People re-mortgaged their houses and borrowed from relatives - all that money should be paid back in full, with interest. Then we can talk about compensation for lost businesses, psychological and physical health issues, etc. The government is dragging its heels on this one.
Absolutely - the should be for costs/losses/losss of potential earnings etc, and then compensated for the emotional stress and wrongful convictions etc.
I read the other day that the original settlement from 2019 was only applicable to some of the SPMs from the class action. The ones that did get money agreed to share it with other SPMs who didn't qualify. Currently the government and POL are arguing that those SPMs (who were given settlemen money by other SPMs) should have that deducted from any future compensation payments.
So even now, after everything that has come to light, they are still being absolute *******s!
This comment - 100%!!!
Had Horizon been working as claimed, then there would have been no incentive for sub-postmasters to steal as it would have been impossible to get away with it long term. The last thing a thief would do is phone a help line and draw someone's attention to the discrepancy.
You can still see the pain in this chap. It’s still so very raw. I feel for him.
3 years of his life he will never get back, disgusting
Fukusu should be held as accountable as the PO and decision makers in this scandal should be behind bars.
That includes the 1997 to 2010 politicians who were eager to push out horizon from the top of Government.
Poo-jitsu and the Poos-toffice are both responsible and equally evil.
Fujitsu has apologised for the great harm that it caused to hundreds of people.
HOWEVER, Fujitsu's silence has been deafening when it comes to the matter of ensuring that it will never repeat its malevolent behaviour.
Edit: please remind me to never again purchase any Fujitsu products.
Imagine if you'd lost a decade or more of your life. Done jail time. Had your family ruined. Been unable to work. Lost earnings. Lost your home. Missed the best years of your children's childhoods. Probably had a bad knock on effect on THEIR prospects.
How much compensation would be enough? Surely we're talking in the millions per postmaster.
Well you get £264,650 for the loss of both your legs.
I still don't understand why people are talking such low figures for " compensation". Individuals should sue Fujitsu and the post office for millions and millions. So many charges apply. Stop asking for an offer and start to sue one by one. If necessary find an American lawyer who is also qualified to practice law in the UK because there is no way that this would be happening in the US. Fujitsu would have filed a bankruptcy by now to protect their assets. They absolutely would be found guilty in America..not sure why it is so hard in the UK
@@daviddowsett1658 That's compensation for the future impact though; harder to quantify, and I would suggest in reality likely far less damaging than what's happened to these postmasters if you look at relative outcomes ten years later.
@daviddowsett1658 Sometimes I delve into the comments on CZcams just to find the most stupid comment i can. You have won.
Because people in this country have a lay down and take it approach sadly.@@faraboverubieskerry
If I knew I was partly responsible for people going to jail I could not live with myself. I find this so hard to believe and take in.
This happens all the time in companys, you bring up a issue about bad work practises and you get treated like enemy number 1
Yep. Nothing like this at all, nowhere near but working at the NHS back in the day in IT I bought up the issue of the new background image they used for Windows. It was white background with an NHS local in the corner. It was impossible to read anything on it, all the icon text blended into the background. I pointed this out, but being a contractor was told to shut up, quite literally. I started to tell users to complain themselves as no one was listening to me. More users complained, so they were forced to change it.
You’re so right take a look across the pond at Boeing, profit at all cost and in their case several hundred lives.
@@wobby1516 True. Including the suspicious sudden death of a whistleblower.
@@TheStevenWhitingyou didn't happen to mention contaminated blood did you?
It’s a shame that this inquiry will drag on .
Yet the post office could prosecute and destroy these postmasters lives in a matter of months🙁 They should nerved have been able to prosecute 🙁 This was a job for the police to conduct the investigations into these so called fraudulent losses . I am livid that now we know that no postmasters were to blame for those massive losses . Get on and settle this pronto 🙏🏼
"It’s a shame that this inquiry will drag on" NO it's not a shame, the shame is why it's dragged on and on ! The shame is where most people believe it originates from.
You idiots the purpose of the inquiry is to lift up every rock and expose everything that was done wrong. That’s why it has “dragged on”. The amount of evidence that can be used to hold those responsible to account is invaluable but you simpletons want every thing done in a couple of days 😂
I doubt the police would have done better, in Northern Ireland and Scotland, the police where Co opted bythe Post Office.
They ruined so many lives over their refusal to admit the computer system was flawed.
The lethal consequences of flawed computer systems have been known about for over 50 years. It is blatantly obvious that Fujitsu have willfully and maliciously ignored that fact.
Fujitsu Management Should ALSO be in Court
Britain needs to see arrests now not tomorrow.
The government Post office / Fujitsu come forward now & confres.
I am so glad that I decided not to take a senior IT role at Fujitsu in the early noughties.
Thank God you didn’t, probably would have worsened the situation. Fujitsu also saved from wasting their money ❤
@@CEO786 mean
I am too a former Fujitsu employee. I’m happy to answer any questions you may have
I did warranty incoming here in Canada for a Japanese car company and was fired for OKing a guy visiting another dealer, because he insisted he was being lied to by small town bullies. I was dressed down like id been caught committing insider trading and FIRED ON THE SPOT.
Company first, and company only.
Shouldn't be any BS about Fushitsu going to contribute to the damages ... needs a massive class action against them and the Post Orifice ... AND it needs to include punitive damages ... or they will do it again and again ... then go hunting for the cowardly management that spent their time hiding all this from the legal system ... and some gaol time ... Apologies are just hollow now ... Fushitsu are only saying that because they have been completely caught out with no where to hide ...
I cant belive that BT have not sacked Adam Crozier he was up to his neck in this as Post Office CEO.
Everyone who has worked with computer systems knows that they have bugs. That does not mean they should not be used, but that the fact should be recognised and allowed for, and the bugs sorted out.
Funny that any error used to be (like 20-30 years ago) blamed on "the computer", it used to be a standing joke, yet now what the computer says is taken as gospel, even by high court judges.
Why are people not being properly compensated right now. They don’t have anything to prove.
I've worked for two companies (and left) which have collapsed because they would not spend the time fixing software and gradually their reputation caused their demise. In both cases this was because the CEO wanted to "save" money and do other things instead (like paying themselves bonuses). In both cases, the CEO did not really understand the software process either and it seems Fujitsu and certainly the PO had no clue either. Meanwhile, post the damning 2019 verdict on Horizon, Rishi Sunak continued doling out over a £billion to Fujitsu. Surely all the Fujitsu contracts and software will have to be examined and audited and possibly ditched - at great cost to the taxpayer as always. But hey! The Tories are past masters at wasting shed loads of money and running up debts.
It's not wasted if it ends up in your mates pockets.
It's corruption and extortion on the part of Fujitsu and post office senior management.
A lady in charge of a sub post office where she has worked all her life has now retired, she was not accused but now is scared to continue. Now the post office will shut for good in a remote village in Scotland, no one will take it over, leaving the small hamlet further cut off. Cheers Post Office then you wonder why you are loosing trade.
We have one po here on the Isle of Yell. And they 2 are considering closing because of this scandal, they are scared that even after the inquiry the po will not change its ways.
The Post Office,the Government and Fujitsu are rotten to the core knowing there was an on going problem and sending innocent people to prison. People have been left mentally scared for life.
But it is his fault that it happened. He stayed silent in the face of all that suffering when he should have said something. SOMEBODY HAS TO GO TO JAIL OVER THIS... FOR A VERY LONG TIME!!
I just saw that Paula Vennells will be one of several big names giving witness in the next phase of the inquiry.
This is just so awful!
The call center staff member does have a level of responsibility- Nate you did nothing despite knowing ! You still took the pay check, given what call center pays, you could go get a job elsewhere. Only coming out now because it got revealed. Nate and others are party to this not innocent bystanders. Sorry but true
Well! This disgraceful saga just gets better each day eh!
It over 700 sub post masters were prosecuted and another potentially 2-2500 falsely accused then the same prosecution system policy must be used against the post office and this company.
Can anyone believe, that as of right now, today, there are many of these poor postmasters are still in jail or have not been given the opportunity to have their conviction overturned !!! I would think any "justice" system would have everyone immediately released while the system sorts through this. Unbelievable.
The Post Office NOR Fujitsu should NOT be allowed ANYWARE NEAR the Compensation Scheme, It should Be An Independant Body who ACTUALLY SPEAKS to the Postmasters BEFORE deciding on Compensation
Fairly certain the call handlers weren't well paid so why not come clean to the post masters at the time? Especially when they must have known people were being sent to jail. Given they had post masters numbers, why not inform them anonymously outside of working hours?
Fair point.
that's exactly how I feel about it. As far as I'm concerned they were complicit.
Because they would have been fired on the spot.
I mean REALLY.
@@Exiled.New.Yorker not if they informed anonymously. Also we have protection for whistlebowers here
Fujitsu employees should have blown the whistle about this. They could have done it anonymously too. Especially the programmers who knew the software was broken before release. How the Post Office did not put two and two together to question how so many postmasters were facing shortfalls is crazy. I heard the government were pressured to sign off on the release of Horizon. Pressured or paid off? I think the public need to know of EVERY contract our government has with Fujitsu at present and potential contracts pending approval. I get the feeling we will discover contracts were granted after the Horizon scandal came to light. It is clear Fujitsu and Post Office are being handled with kid gloves. Exonerate and pay out all the compensation owed to the victims. Split the bill between Fujitsu and Post Office as a huge fine. The last thing these victims need is for their government to fail them too.
These were the workers told to say no one was having issues with horizon? If so they should be held responsible along with everyone if they knew better.
Are you a perfect person? Wow.
There's more real emotion and genuine regret from this guy, than we've seen in any of the hard faced PO lot. For his tiny role in this, working in a call centre for maybe 25-30K, and no huge bonuses.
people at the top set the standards more call centre staff please come out and help get to the bottom of this saga. well done for coming out now maybe Paula Vennells the boss should maybe follow the example - will she though ?
Senior Fujitsu and post office management, stonewalling and plane lying to post office workers, and government, and union officials failing to back them. It's hard to see how it could be any clearer, authority is untrustworthy
Will the Enquiry ask Fujitsu bosses about the team that worked in the basement who were observed remotely changing data? It’s a simple yes/no answer.
As far as I'm concerned the call handlers were complicit.
Because they had to eat? Bite. Me.
the call center managers who forced their employees to lie are complicit. Don't blame the people on the coal face working a soul destroying job to pay their rent
They're complicit. Total lack of integrity. They watched people having their lives destroyed.
It’s disgusting.
I think it matters if those call handlers knew that sub postmasters were criminally liable for discrepancies horizon reported. If they were and yet they still lied and covered up, then they knowingly and willingly acted in a way that could lead to unjust and false prosecutions, perverting the course of justice. I doubt they will ever be held to account and neither will their managers but I'd personally feel it only right that they too feel the long arm of the law on their shoulders after this. They knew what they were doing was wrong and "I was only obeying orders" is never an acceptable defence when you know something is abhorrent and likely to be illegal.
In every workplace one encounters middle management who ignore stonewall or blame those who draw attention to faults or bad practice. But the Post Office had top management who conspired to perpetuate bad practice. The guy on the helpline has now come out and spoken about his knowledge of a faulty system. He also knew people were being sent to prison and bankrupted based on that system. He had to. I’m sorry but he shrugged “felt bad” . No he did bad. He could have found a new job and given the callers that information, it would have all come out sooner. If I was a sub postmaster he’d get no forgiveness from me. Too little too late. See something say something. Not think of your own financial security. Yes I have lost a job for speaking out. I gave information and had my contract withdrawn.
The police need to step and do their jobs and find everyone at Fujitsu and the post office that covered this is - they have committed the offence of perverting the court of justice by allowing people to go for prison for something they didn’t do.
Also Fujitsu knew the software had massive bugs right from the start and should be paying 100% of the compensation - as opposed to a majority of it being paid for by the British tax payer.
According to Computer Weekly there was a bunch of PO staff, investigators etc. who received boosts to their bonuses based on successful convictions! That reduced incentives for those people to look for the truth… didn’t it?
The government, post office and Fujitsu sicken me with their dishonesty, but most of all Fujitsu who were aware their system was faulty and still hiding behind the enquiry. That in my mind even worse that their faulty software that they failed to admit to. Fujitsu ought to be putting up millions of pounds now, right now, to right their terrible wrongs. I thought Japanese company’s were honest and they had very high moral values, but not this company. The U.K. should stop all contracts with Fujitsu as soon as is reasonable possible because they can’t be trusted..
The inquiry has brought to light (Winter's evidence) at least one case where the Horizon system was crediting money, as well as debiting it, but the PO didn't include that in their prosecution evidence.
And companies want to replace this minimum level of 'support' from people who buy design are not allowed to know the depths of the system they are working on with LLMs. Goooooood luck everyone. Worse is to come.
So why didn't these call center people go to the press, why didn't they go over to the Post Masters and Mistresses and tell them what he knew.A job is just a job, but your conscience means much more than a damn job.
The Fujitsu service desk were not the people sending postmasters to court. That would be Royal Mail's team. The Fujitsu service desk knew the application was rubbish but I doubt they knew how the data generated by the system was being used. I suspect the Fujitsu engineers would have raised red flags if they had known what Royal Mail was doing with the obviously faulty data.
What a rubbish system. If you work somewhere and call a work helpline they are normally always able to access your screen so they can see for themselves what's wrong. If they can't, then they are part of the problem 😂😂
Well this is part of the issue, the Sub-Postmasters were responsible for any discrepancies, so it's like they hire the software from the PO for their shop's PO, so the call centre should not have access to "take control of their screen", the issue was they were accessing there system without the Subs knowledge and making changes to fix bugs BADDY
That took courage - I understand Nate Orrow is the first Fujitsu whistleblower since Richard Roll (via reporter Nick Wallis) in 2015. Maybe the floodgates will open now, with the "sanctity and integrity" of employment NDAs rightly trampled.
Whistle blowing is healthy , and should be freely expressed .No person should ever except any contract which restricted their honesty and concern.
"employees 'dragged over coals' if they admitted issues " with anything in the UK. Employees are exactly that, they are paid to do a job and ask NO questions !
More service desk people need to stand up and be counted. They should also be held responsible for lying on behalf of the company/institution.
These peoples lives just got destroyed. This is hard to watch.
Hauled over the coals? The Navy keel-hauls such
Fired on the spot.
Yeah you're right I hadn't picked this up from the enquiry. How did the situation arise where the SPM has to prove innocence rather than the other way round?
This whole episode is abhorrent. From beginning to end top to bottom. Complacency negligence and lies. Fujitsu and the PO. managers, Directors and laywers should be prosecuted and some - a great many - jailed. Fujitsu should be made to pay up in some cases individuals should receive many millions plus interest. Ultimately it shows our legal systems flaws. Adversarial? Bull. The law was not followed. The Judges (hundreds of them) if they had looked through the papers properly they would have realised that the 'Expert' was biased and not Independent. They also assumed that individuals were lying not the lawyers who were. In some cases they cut off the very lifeline the defence had. The whole debacle is being relived through no compensation. An independent compensation board should have been set up years ago and payments made. I'm pretty certain if the perpetrators had been jailed then compensation would go through imnediately.
They weren't sorry when we didn't know about it
This country has no moral compass.
From the very top, the corrupt government, to the very bottom, those plebs that keep voting for them. No moral compass, no compassion, no sense.
All you needed was a good forensic accountant, he'd prove that they didn't have the damned the money.
Poor fella, 3 years in prison for no reason.
Oh boo hoo to this guy. Yeah, him being complicit in deceiving sub-postermasters makes him the victim. Let me see if I find my tiny violin.
They were alllooking for bugs that was in fact the access to Fujitsu to access and alter computers. Theywill freely admit to errors to avoid discovery of computer fraud. by Fujitsu. I wonder how many other systems they have access to ??
Fujitsu just bought an English company. It was this English software company’s designed, installed and operated by English staff .
Politicians repeating the same BS over and over again when responding to a simple question. Fujitsu needs to cough up and the Post Office managers that knew what went on, jailed.
Which politicians were involved, other than the ones that gave their support to the Post masters? It was a group of mp’s that pressed on the ‘problem’ their postmaster constituents were suffering.
The management knew full well, that was the problem. Do these news presenters have a brain?
The Fujitsu call handles certainly didn't have much of a conscience. All well and good showing some remorse now, a decade or two overdue.
This kind of turning a blind eye has been a feature of so many scandals. It's amazing what people will accept as a norm in return for a monthly pay packet.
Is Horizon software still being used. Has it been fixed or are there still problems? Looking in on this from another country, I am confused, though I am assuming that those tragic scenarios have come to an end.
If you know there is something criminal going on...Report it !!! Call centre ....Good grief...... It's pathetic to think you could also laugh... In a response to what these poor people went through....
I cannot understand why it was not always known that a 'supervisor' control on the software, because there always is!
Withdraw the PO right to take out independant prosecutions! Too much money involved to keep people honest. Fujitsu will have been working with PO seniors to keep a wrap on it as all their careers depended on it.
Just as thousands of individual companies have the right to take out a private action, so did the PO. The whole small claims court also operates on that basis. What does need investigating is the financial and resource disparity of the plaintiff and the defendant in this case .
You can be the nicest person in the world, but without courage, it doesn't matter.
yup, he could have manned up years ago.
Sorry, disagree. The risk of being sued pre-Mr Bates would have been too great. But the floodgates are open now.
I still have the nagging feeling...have you ever watched those guys who hack the hackers, and get them busted...i think this is a lot bigger for 2 background entities here than we even speak of yet. The helpline guy's computer was still in the hands of others...could we have a more "robust" investigation, please..
Where's the $$. If this was just a 'bug', why were the errors always in the PO favour?
I want to
Work
For
Fujitsu
❤
So many criminals in this web of deceit and deception
Where else is the software used😢
It was designed for the Post Office, for a lot of £ so it's properly not been used anywhere else.
Some of it was built using visual basic 5 !
Horizon software cost the British Taxpayer over 1.2 billion pounds and never worked properly even now. Amazingly even after this failure Fujitsu were given another IT contract by the Government for the NHS which cost 6 billion pounds and was NEVER DELIVERED! The money was just written off.
@@fredsmith1970I think all of it was written in VB certainly the core cash handler and the message store. one of the developers stated they wrote the Spec documents after the system had been built and they built the real system on top of the prototype code.
@@daviddowsett1658I read that it was designed/intended as a joint project between the DWP and PO (to manage benefit payments by the PO) But the DWP dropped the software (due to misgivings) which was then dumped on the PO so not to "loose" the £700 million spent on it. So it was flawed for it's original purpose from the outset 🤦
Two comments. Does anyone have any confidence that the lessons of this scandal will be learned and the errors, injustice and corruption will not recur? Secondly, it is great the media are all over this now, but where were they when the sub postmasters were being prosecuted ?
Isn't this tantamount to heinous criminal behaviour on the part of those who gave the order to lie to subpostmasters?
Every lawyer in the US right now is wishing that they could practice law in the UK. While I am not fond of America as whole ( yes I am American) I can say that at least with situations like this we have the opportunity to sue for negligence, wrongful harm, defamation of character, inflicted trauma,etc. If American lawyers were on this case Fujitsu would be paying out hundreds of millions of pounds and probably go bankrupt which is what should happen. In fact they would have already filed for bankruptcy if this were the US...just to avoid the inevitable and try to say they have no money to pay out. Can someone please explain why individual victims in this scandal cannot sue the post office, the post office leaders like Paula, Fujitsu and the individuals who harassed and investigated them? Not as a class action suit but individually. Is it just that they didn't have evidence before? Well Now we know Fujitsu lied. That is fraud and willful neglect ...they should pay out millions just for that alone. There are so many charges to be brought against them in a court of law but I am wondering if the British don't really know that they can sue. It is crazy that anyone went to jail with zero evidence to prove their guilt. It is like a dystopian film 😢
So true. I agree 100%. I don’t know how these people can live with themselves knowing this. Utterly shameful
People commited suicide! Ffs!
I like the Bee Keepers response to issues like this, trouble is petrol is so expensive
Time to remove Fujitsu from all UK Government contracts now
They should have come forward sooner😮
How about the PO immediately pays "provisional" damages, while waiting for the final amount to be sorted out?
The lawyer's will keep the inquiry alive ,till they made enough money out of it ,or until the government can find a big enough carpet to sweep it under
easy to find people that wish they had not worked on a project / client / employer - who has not?
And the length of time is seen where legals are trawling through witness statements.
So conspiracy to defraud then.
When will heads roll???
I love the way everyone blames the software...... someone or person s from that horizon company were stealing money on a big scale . Tjis is no mistake straight theft and passed the bkame to the post masters. Someone or many need to go to jail. Wheres the money gone??
Yet this government is giving them contracts and yet isnt prosecuting Fujitsu at all
How the PO is allowed to do what they are now doing with compensation etc is an absolute joke, british justice at its best again huh its a laughing stock
What is the betting that Fujitsu 'phoenix' before liability is apportioned?
Now look at our national lottery software, you will also find the issues
It happened at the Stevenage site !!!!!
Sad little henchmen for going along with this
Why didnt he report his bosses to thd media? How could hs sleep at night?
was in post man patters bright red van 🤣 had a black ann white cat holic in there as well 🤣🤣🤣
Isn't that a crime? If not WHY NOT?
Typical of Britain today
😢
The corporate sector today is the modern equivalent of plantation owners.
Another person trying to make money off the poor postmasters/postmistress.
Shame this guy didn't speak out years ago