Dear Data Protection and Information Rights Team,

Under FOI2024/00150 the Post Office has disclosed minutes from a Board meeting on 25 September 2013.

Reference is made in this document (p7) to the notifications which were to be made by the PO CFO to the underwriters and to the Professional Indemnity or Directors and Officers Insurance in order to clarify if Horizon-related claims against the business were covered.

Please can you disclose the relevant notifications which were sent by the CFO to these bodies.

Yours sincerely,
Eleanor Shaikh

Dear Data Protection and Information Rights Team,

Please can you update on the progress of this request which was submitted eight weeks ago.

Yours sincerely,

Eleanor Shaikh

Dear Data Protection and Information Rights Team,

Please can you update on the progress of FOI2024/00485 which was made on 24 March 2024.

Yours sincerely
Eleanor Shaikh

Dear Information Rights Team,

Please can you update on the status of this request, originally submitted on 24 March 2024, along with an explanation for the six month delay.

As I understand, you have aggregated FOI2024/00485 with my request for disclosure of the Horizon update paper of July 2013, requested on 25 March 2024.

I have received no response from you since my prompts regarding both requests on 3 August 2024. If no substantive response is forthcoming by 25 September 2024, I will be referring the delay to the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Yours sincerely,
Eleanor Shailh

Dear Information Rights Team,

Thank you for your response today which was no doubt prompted by the communication to you of 1 October 2024 from the Information Commissioner’s Office following my complaint regarding your handling of FOI 2024/00485 (IC-334147-Y4S8).

It is unclear why it has taken almost seven months for you disclose that:

i) one relevant document requested is already in the public domain and;

ii) you do not hold the remaining material which is within scope of the request.

It is also unclear why you have chosen a search window from 1 July 2013 to 30 September 2013.

The minute to which FOI 2024/00485 refers, which notes the CFO’s obligation to ensure appropriate notifications were made to the Post Office’s underwriters, was made on 25 September 2013 (pg 7 of Board Meeting Minutes). It is not possible, therefore, for this to have been actioned prior to 25 September 2013. Indeed the minute suggests that the CFO would action this only after the Board had received a noting paper to clarify the Post Office’s current position with regard to the Professional Indemnity or Directors and Officers’ Insurance.

I therefore request that you conduct your search again focusing on the three month period after 25 September 2013.

Due to the already significant delays in your response to this FOI, any delay beyond 20 working days of your receipt of this request will be referred immediately to the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Yours sincerely,
Eleanor Shaikh

Dear Information Rights Team,

Thank you for your email of 15 October. You are correct, I did not request an internal review of your response to FOI 2024/00485 as you assumed in your reply of 11 October but neither can this be considered a new request.

My email to you of 10 October made clear the inappropriateness of your search window of 1 July 2013 to 30 September 2013. A direction to be actioned was made by the Post Office Board on 25 September 2013; it is therefore illogical for you to have sought to locate relevant documentation by conducting a search within a time frame which pre-dates the Board’s instruction by over two months.

I therefore suggested a more logical time frame for your search as being the three months immediately after 25 September 2013. This is not a new request for information.

Yours sincerely,
Eleanor Shaikh

Dear Information Rights Team

Thank you for your latest email.

I am not submitting a further FOI request; I am still seeking the same information as in my original submission of 24 March 2024:

‘Please can you disclose the relevant notifications which were sent by the CFO to these bodies’ [ie to the underwriters and to the Professional Indemnity or Directors and Officers Insurance].

It appears, according to your criteria, that this should be treated as a request for an internal review.

So please can you conduct an internal review into why an appropriate time-frame was not applied to your original search for documents under 2024/00485. In conducting this review please can you complete your search by using the appropriate time frame as indicated to you in my email of 10 October 2024.

Yours sincerely,
Eleanor Shaikh