We all know the value of a Post Office – whether you’re old enough (like me) to remember taking a ‘giro’, ‘Child Benefit book’ or similar cheque along to ‘cash’ every week at your local Post Office, or you’re sending a parcel, taking passport photos, buying foreign currency, or just buying stamps! It’s true there are a lot less of them around than there used to be, but there can be no doubt that our Post Office workers are people we like to think we can trust to handle our money, deal with us fairly and respect us. Not so, for the many Post Office workers across the country, it would appear…

Mr. Bates vs. The Post Office

There is no escaping the news (which isn’t that ‘new’ at all) charting the life-changing experiences of Post Office employees at the hands of their employer over more than two decades. The recent ITV drama - based on real-life events, ‘Mr. Bates vs. The Post Office’, laid bare just some of the alleged negative treatment and harassment of employees of the Post Office across the nation. Accused of theft and fraud when, as it turns out, the Fujitsu system installed in Post Offices over twenty years ago was at fault. Without providing too many spoilers (it’s a must-watch four-part drama, which you can watch on ITVX) Post Office workers were ‘visited’ by auditors, threatened to provide access to their accounts, suspended, sacked, taken to court, convicted and some imprisoned. All because of the Post Office’s failure to disclose that the Horizon system they installed was the real culprit for thousands of pounds appearing to ‘go missing’ from Post Office electronic accounts.

Deny, deny, deny?

So, with this happening up and down the country, which suggests hundreds of previously trustworthy employees suddenly became criminals overnight, what do you think a good employer would do? Deny, deny, deny, as the Post Office did? Or, perhaps, honour the psychological contract* – that invisible agreement between employer and employee that is built on trust, commitment and fairness.

What happens when the psychological contract is broken in this way? The Post Office’s alleged treatment of trusted employees, some of whom had worked tirelessly for them for decades, clearly resulted in a sustained attack on the psychological contract (effectively a ‘psychological contract breach, or PCB), destroying the trust established between employees and their managers – at all levels. Research has clearly identified the link between PCB and reduced physical and mental health and wellbeing of employees (Reimann and Guzy, 2017). No wonder, then, that so many Post Office workers were shown to have been affected in such ways following their unceremonious removal from the jobs they devoted their lives to.

Psychological contracts are for life

While politicians debate the urgency of compensation and overturning of convictions for the many who suffered as a direct result of the Post Office’s handling of the Horizon faults, future questions may ask how the Post Office – and other employers, such as P&O Ferries and the like – can successfully reintroduce and maintain a psychological contract between themselves and their employees. One thing is for sure, if I could give them all one piece of advice, I would suggest that they treat their employees the way they would like to be treated in that position. Psychological contracts are for life and should not only apply when all is well in the employment relationship – and honesty, trust and transparency should form the foundation of this unwritten and invisible but essential agreement between employers and employees!

*CIPD (2023) The Psychological Contract. Available at: https://www.cipd.org/uk/knowledge/factsheets/psychological-factsheet/

Reimann, M. and Guzy, J. (2017) ‘Psychological contract breach and employee health: The relevance of unmet obligations for mental and physical health’. Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 33:1, pp. 1-11. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rpto.2016.11.001