Post Place of work Horizon contract extension is section of mission to bring Fujitsu work in-dwelling

Post Place of work Horizon contract extension is section of mission to bring Fujitsu work in-dwelling

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The Post Place of work is to switch work done by Fujjtsu in-dwelling when its outsourcing contract ends, and is already recruiting IT consultants

Karl Flinders

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Published: 08 Apr 2021 14: 33

The Post Place of work’s switch to elongate its controversial 22-twelve months contract with Fujitsu to assemble and give a select to the Horizon retail and accounting system is section of a opinion to bring the work in-dwelling.

An announcement this week that the contact, which started in 1999, will transcend the unusual March 2023 expiry, acknowledged this used to be section of a switch route of. Even supposing it did now not advise what it used to be transferring to, an interview given by Post Place of work CEO Nick Read offers a clue.

In response to Read in an interview with The Grocer journal in December, there are plans to bring the service supplied by Fujitsu in-dwelling, with a recruitment marketing and marketing and marketing campaign below technique to bolster the IT personnel.

Bringing the service in-dwelling would fit with the Post Place of work’s choice to elongate the newest contract with Fujitsu by a additional twelve months to March 2024, as a result of the length of time it might possibly maybe hold emigrate the service from Fujitsu to the Post Place of work’s hold personnel. It would also give the Post Place of work the chance to fix the complications it has skilled within the past on legend of Horizon complexities and person complications.

The Horizon contract, and the retail and accounting system at its core, resulted in tons of of subpostmasters being prosecuted for monetary crimes, corresponding to theft and false accounting, according to proof from the IT system. In what has been called one of many very finest miscarriages of justice in UK historical past, some subpostmasters had been sent to penal complicated and tons of had been made bankrupt, after being blamed for unexplained losses. It has since been proved that the Horizon system contained errors that can maybe also bask in triggered unexplained losses.

A High Court docket case proved subpostmasters moral that pc errors had been inflicting the losses and since then, about 50 prosecuted subpostmasters bask in had their convictions sent for enchantment.

Fujitsu, the Post Place of work and its owner, the authorities, bask in all been blamed for allowing the scandal to occur after subpostmasters had been vindicated after almost two decades of campaigning.

In a contract award take a look at this week pronouncing the 12-month extension, the Post Place of work acknowledged: “In order to put together the Horizon settlement for expiry, and in order to obtain transitional give a select to from Fujitsu Companies and products following such expiry, the Horizon settlement shall be prolonged for a term of an additional one twelve months.”

In the interview with The Grocer, Read acknowledged he wanted to gain Horizon extra person-friendly. “The system used to be designed a truly prolonged time within the past, and used to be made for the Crown Post Offices, no longer franchises,” he acknowledged. “I don’t mediate a immense deal of view used to be taken as to how easy it mandatory to be to feature in a busy retail atmosphere.”

Wiltshire-basically based entirely mostly subpostmaster Label Baker commented: “It would gain sense to bring as powerful of it as doable in-dwelling, if of route they bask in the expertise.”

One IT legitimate posted on Twitter that the Post Place of work had been recruiting senior IT executives. “I do know one very perfect, skilled person the Post Place of work has recruited lately. They had been very lucky to gain her,” acknowledged the post.

Thousands of subpostmasters, who hold and manage Post Place of work branches, had been utilizing the Horizon machine since its introduction in 1999. The system used to be supposed to revolutionise how branches operated by automating largely manual processes, but soon after its introduction, subpostmasters started struggling unexplained accounting shortfalls.

In 2009, Computer Weekly educated the tales of seven subpostmasters struggling from the losses, which resulted in many extra who had suffered losses coming forward (look timeline below for Computer Wwekly protection since 2009).

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