Horizon Convictions Redress Scheme

The Horizon Convictions Redress Scheme (HCRS) was launched by the UK Government to enable people wrongly convicted of a crime because of the Horizon IT system used by the Post Office to apply for financial redress.

The scheme was established following the passing of new laws in May – The Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Act 2024 – allowing hundreds of convictions of innocent postmasters to be quashed without the need to go to court.

Please contact our team at Hudgell Solicitors today and we will register the claim for you.

Telephone on 0808 231 6065

Start my claim.

Email [email protected].

Your claim will be immediately registered with the scheme to start the compensation process.

You will be offered a consultation with a senior solicitor, and we shall provide provisional advice on the likely value of your claim.

It may be that the value of your claim could exceed the fixed compensation package of £600,000. Our priority is to ensure you receive maximum compensation in the quickest time possible.

At the end of the day, we will offer our advice, but the decision on whether to accept the fixed £600,000 proposal is yours.

We will do all that for you.

If you have received a letter from the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) in England or Wales, the Justice Directorate in Scotland or the Department for Justice in Northern Ireland, saying your conviction has been overturned under the new law, you will be able to fully register for the scheme.

Please send a copy of that letter to us.

Letters are being sent to former Post Office workers, the relatives of people who have since died and may be able to make a claim, and to people the MOJ feels may be entitled to compensation, but more information on their case is required.

Our legal team is able to register your claim for compensation and support you through the process. We urge anyone who has received a letter or is expecting a letter, to contact us urgently.

You do not need to wait for a letter to start the process though. Contact us now.

Once your claim has been registered with the scheme, you will be entitled to a £200,000 interim payment.

You can then decide whether to accept the fixed £600,000 offer or have your case fully qualified.

If you proceed to have your case fully quantified, you will receive a further £250,000 – taking your payments to £450,000. However, if your case is ultimately found to have a value less than £600,000, you will not receive any more than the £450,000 you have.

If you accept the fixed compensation proposal of £600,000, you will receive a further payment of £400,000 to add to the initial £200,000 payment. This is a final settlement.

There could be a couple of reasons for this.

The Government have yet to write to all those impacted, so you may still receive a letter.

It may also be possible that the Government does not have your contact details to be able to write to you.

If this is the case, we advise getting in touch with our dedicated Post Office Horizon claims team here at Hudgell Solicitors. We will look into your case seeking clarification with the Government, and ensure your details are registered accordingly.

Once your claim has been accepted by the scheme, you can elect to accept the £600,000 fixed compensation settlement.

However, if you elect to have your claim individually assessed the £600,000 is no longer guaranteed and you may be limited to the amount you have already received in interim payments (£450k).

Our team of lawyers have been representing victims of this scandal for over three years and we have successfully concluded many claims where the value has been in excess of £600,000.

Our experience is that many victims simply do not know what losses they can be compensated for and therefore do not realise that the fixed compensation package offer of £600,000 may be inadequate.

We will properly advise you as to the value of your claim and which option to elect once we know more about your case.

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The Post Office will pay all reasonable legal costs incurred for our work and we won’t take anything from your damages, you will keep 100% of the compensation you are awarded.

This means you can have the support of legal experts who have worked on hundreds of cases relating to the Horizon scandal for the past five years overseeing your claim, and ensuring you are fully and fairly compensated.

• We have already nearly helped over 100 sub postmasters to have their convictions set aside.
• Unrivalled experience across all Post Office compensation schemes.
• We can confirm your eligibility and register your claim for compensation.
• We can advise on whether to accept the fixed £600,000 or to push for individual assessment.
• We have been successful in securing many increases in damages following initial offers made by the Post Office.
• We have direct channels with the Post Office and the Government to help in accelerating your case.
• We can help at no cost to you – the Post Office will pay any costs incurred and we won’t take anything from your compensation.

The scheme is now open.

For people who accept the fixed £600,000 compensation package, the claim will conclude very quickly.

If a full forensic analysis of losses is required, this will obviously take longer. Typically, this can be between 9-12 months depending on complexity.

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Relatives can pursue claims through the Horizon Convictions Redress Scheme and claim the compensation on behalf of their loved ones’ estate.

Even if you don’t have any evidence relating to prosecutions and convictions, but you do know that your loved one worked in a Post Office at the time when people were being prosecuted in large numbers (between 1995 and 2015), it is worth getting in touch with our dedicated team, as we will be able to check against Post Office records.