Dorset postmistress ‘lived in fear’ in Post Office scandal

Tracey Merritt, 56, ran two post offices in Dorset – Yetminster and Chetnole – and has spoken of her ‘heart-breaking’ experience of being wrongly accused of stealing money from the Post Office in the wake of the screening of ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office. Ms Merritt was dismissed in 2009 shortly after the Horizon computer accounting system for was rolled out into use for post offices across the country. The then-new computer system showed false statements that thousands of pounds had gone missing from both of Ms Merrtt’s branches.

She was one of more than 700 sub-postmasters and mistresses convicted after faulty accounting software made it look as though money was missing from their branches, in what has been described as one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in UK history. Problems initially started on the day before the introduction of the Horizon computer system at the Post Office in Yetminster around 2009. Ms Merritt said that on the first morning, the new system showed that the branch was missing GBP1,000.

After phoning a helpline, Ms Merritt said she was told to “press some button”, which then “doubled the debt”, showing the branch was missing GBP2,000. She said: “As part of my contract I had to pay any of the losses. “I was told my contract manager ‘generously’ offered to take GBP500 out of my wages every month until it was paid off so I could continue working.”

Months later, Ms Merritt was offered the chance to take over a second Post Office in Chetnole, which she accepted “reluctantly” because the branch would have otherwise been closed. Her daughter worked alongside her in the Yetminster branch and agreed to run it one day a week whilst Ms Merritt ran the Chetnole branch. Shortly after taking over, the same computer issues arose again and Ms Merritt began putting her own money into the system to keep it “topped up”.

One day after taking time off to go away, a postmistress brought in for cover reported Ms Merritt to the Post Office due to the losses in the accounts. She said: “Auditors told me there was a loss of GBP13,500 and I would have to pay for it. “I was told I would have to read a confession to my manager, that I took the money and spent it on shopping.

“Where am I going to spend GBP13,500 on a Wednesday night in a small village? “The lead investigator contacted me and told me to plead guilty. He said they would go easier on me.”

The situation then escalated and Ms Merritt’s house was searched by police and unbeknownst to her she was charged with theft. She said: “My house was searched. Before they entered the house they were telling me to confess.

They said if I didn’t they would send me to prison, they’d make sure I had a hard time in there and they would get my daughter sent to prison. “They followed me to my house, they went into my bedroom, a man went through my underwear drawer making comments about it. “One day one of my friends told me to look at the local paper – The Western Gazette – my face was on the front page saying I had failed to appear in court and had five charges against me.

“They had failed to tell me or my solicitor that we had to be in court. “24 hours later the charges were dropped but the damage was done.” She was prosecuted for theft, but as the charges were dropped, she could not claim damages.

Ms Merritt said she was warned that more charges would be brought against her and police would come to talk to her again about her case. “I spent ten years terrified a policeman would turn up at my door with handcuffs,” she added. “They made me cut communications with my daughter.

They said because she worked at the Post Office, if we spoke it could be seen as colluding, “I had to sack my daughter from the Post Office without any reason and I couldn’t tell her why. “For 18 months I couldn’t speak to my daughter.

It was heart-breaking. “I saw on a Facebook post that my daughter was pregnant, she had posted a scan of her baby, that was the last straw for me. “I got in touch with my solicitor to speak to the police, they said ‘sorry we hadn’t told you, you can talk to your daughter now’.

“The whole thing was a joke. That was my daughter. We worked together every day, we were best friends.

“It was horrible, like having my arm ripped off my body. “My son lived in fear that one day I wasn’t going to be at home and I’d be in prison. “To this day I feel an awful guilt.

My one sole job as a mother is to protect my children and it felt like I had failed. I brought the monsters into the house and I cannot forgive myself for that.” Ms Merritt gave evidence at a public inquiry which is currently hearing from sub-postmasters and mistresses who were convicted.

It will also hear from the Post Office and the government.