Approximately £663 million has been paid to over 4,300 claimants across four schemes for the victims of Post Office Horizon scandal. This is up from £594 million figure reported last month.
Sharing the latest report, Department for Business and Trade (DBT) stated on Friday (7) that £315 million has been paid under Horizon Shortfall Scheme (HSS), including interim payments while £128 m has been paid under Group Litigation Order (GLO) Scheme.
£65 million has been paid under Overturned Convictions (OC) and £156 million has been paid under Horizon Convictions Redress Scheme (HCRS).
Initial interim payments are available to eligible postmasters upon getting their conviction overturned on the grounds that it was reliant on Horizon evidence, states the department.
As of 31 October 2024, all 111 eligible claimants have either reached full and final settlement or received a minimum of £200,000 through interim payments.
From these 111, Post Office Ltd has received 82 full and final claims.
Of these 82 claims, 66 have been paid and a further 7 have received offers. The remaining 9 are awaiting offers from Post Office Ltd.
"Post Office Ltd has been progressing non-pecuniary settlements first to get money to postmasters as quickly as possible, which means a number of partial settlements have been reached in addition to the full and final settlements published here. Post Office Ltd continues to work on finalising these outstanding claims," states the department.
Under GLO scheme, the department had received 408 completed claims from eligible GLO postmasters. 252 have been paid and a further five have accepted offers and are awaiting payment. Another 126 postmasters have received offers from DBT and the remaining 24 are awaiting offers.
In HSS, £315 million has been paid including £33.3 million in interim payments to original claimants and £7.9 million in interim payments to late applications.
DBT informs, "On 13 March 2024, the government announced that all eligible HSS claimants would be entitled to a fixed sum award of £75,000 to settle their claim.
Post Office Ltd continues to make top-up payments to claimants who had previously accepted a full and final offer below the value of £75,000, to bring their total redress to £75,000."
The Post Office Horizon scandal saw more than 900 sub postmasters being prosecuted between 1999 and 2015 after faulty Horizon accounting software made it appear that money was missing from their accounts.
Hundreds are still awaiting compensation despite the previous Conservative government announcing that those who have had convictions quashed are eligible for £600,000 payouts.
