Holder, Identity of.

name of "Isaac Acknosskey in trust for Isaac Davies." There was no person, other than Acknosskey, in the family who was called Isaac Davies, and no person of the appropriate age in the family except a child named Charles Isaacs nor was any child named Isaac Davies known to the family.

The Chief Registrar came to the conclusion that the addition of minor" and " seven years of age "must have been made owing to some misapprehension of something Acknosskey said. He was old and illiterate and did not speak good English. He thought, on the evidence as a whole that Acknosskey must have meant to buy the certificates for himself in the name of Isaac Davies, by which he was commonly known. The certificates, in fact, composed practically the whole of his estate and before his death he specifically mentioned them to Jack Davies and told him that he wished the proceeds to be divided between three of his grand-daughters.

Award that 400 certificates (No. CN 335104) held by Isaac Acknosskey in trust for Isaac Davies be repaid and that out of the proceeds the Treasury fees of 41. for this award and of 31. 3s. Od. for the hearing elsewhere than in London be paid and the balance paid to Jack Davies as administrator of the estate of the holder under letters of administration granted out of the Manchester District Registry on June 20th, 1924. Solicitors Dunderdale, Galloway & Co., Manchester.

Repayment, Disputed.

Claim by holder for restoration of certificates repaid to another person by means of a forged signature-War Savings Certificates Regulations, 1919,

Reg. 24.

Samuel George Alvis. 25 certificates.

Hearing and Award, February 6th.

The Chief Registrar's written judgment was as follows:

This case is similar to that of William Thomas Crewe reported in Part A of my report for 1922, page 96.

Repayment of the certificates was obtained by forgery of the holder's signature, and the holder claims the restoration of the certificates, but the Postmaster-General pleads the first paragraph of Regulation 24 of the War Savings Certificates Regulations, 1919.

In my opinion, the action of the holder in this case, unlike that of the holder in Crewe's case, falls within the words of the Regulation. He handed the certificate to his son in order that it might be handed by him to a firm of theatrical agents as security for his son, and they were willing to engage his son only on receipt of the security. It was a member of this firm who forged the holder's signature and received repayment of the certificates.

The act of the holder therefore contributed towards, and indeed was one of the causes of, the fraudulent obtaining of the proceeds of the certificates.

The only question that remains is whether there was a payment in good faith of the sum specified in the warrant to the person purporting to be authorised to receive it. If there was, the Postmaster-General is entitled to rely on the Regulation; if there was not, he is not.

I have heard the evidence of Miss Detenon, who examined the application for repayment at the Money Order Department and of Miss North,

Repayment, Disputed.

who actually made the payment at the local post office. Neither of them remembers the transaction, but it is clear from their initials on the documents that they were the officers who dealt with it. It was Miss Detenon's duty to compare the signature on the application with that on the counterfoil, and to calculate the amount due, and then to pass the papers on for despatch to the paying post office. I think a handwriting expert would have easily come to the conclusion that the two signatures were not written by the same person, and I can imagine a case where the discrepancy was so obvious as to lead to the conclusion that the matter had not been dealt with properly or in good faith. But that is not this case. I think a careful clerk might quite reasonably have passed the signatures, as Miss Detenon did. As to Miss North her duty was to see that the applicant for repayment produced the form sent to him by the Money Order Department and that his signature to the receipt agreed with his signature to the application. I think the documents in this case justified her in paying the person who applied and that there is no reason for holding that she did not pay in good faith to the person entitled.

In these circumstances the defence of the Postmaster-General succeeds, and the application is dismissed.

Award that the application of Samuel George Alvis with respect to savings certificate No. Y 973288 formerly held by him be dismissed.

Claim by holder to certificates alleged to have been repaid on a forged signature-War Savings Certificates Regulations, 1919, Reg. 24 (1), 16 (5) (b).

Dorothy Iris Abbott. 6 certificates.

Hearing and Award, August 15th.

certificates repaid She admitted that

The holder claimed certificates in lieu of six on a signature, which, she alleged was not hers. she had filled up and signed her application for repayment and had left it with the certificates on a sideboard in her house, to which she stated that only her mother and her brother had access. The receipt purported to be signed with her name, and the Chief Registrar was prepared to hold on the document itself that she had signed it. He was further of opinion that the Post Office was covered by Regulation 24 (1) of the War Savings Certificates Regulations, 1919. It was unnecessary for him to decide whether it was covered also by Regulation 16 (5) (b).

Award that the application of Dorothy Iris Abbott in respect of Savings Certificates Nos. E/9 483698, E/27 420147, E/69 669169, F/14 360516, E/79 775932 and E/86 481416 formerly held by her be dismissed.

Claim by holder for restoration of certificates repaid to another person by means of a forged signature-War Savings Certificates Regulations, 1919, Regulations 16, 24.

Jack Rickwood Powell. 100 certificates.

Hearing, 7th October; Award, 10th October.

The written judgment of the Chief Registrar was as follows:-
There is no dispute about the material facts in this case.

The holder handed the certificates to his brother Arthur Powell at the latter's request in order that he might deposit them, as he pretended, as security in order to obtain employment for himself. Arthur Powell

Repayment, Disputed.

produced to the holder what purported to be an agreement between himself and the firm that was to employ him, pretending that the certificates were to be kept intact and returned to the holder at the termination of the employment.

What Arthur Powell in fact did with the certificates was to hand them to a money lender as security for an advance, pretending that he was the holder, and finally authorising the money lender to realise them in repayment of the loan. Repayment was obtained by a forged signature without the knowledge of the holder.

In my opinion, this case is up to this point indistinguishable from that of S. G. Alvis, which I decided last February and which will be in due course reported in my Report for 1924. The circumstances are substantially identical. In that case the certificates were handed by the holder to his son in order that he might use them as security for employment with the bogus firm which is concerned in the present case, and the repayment was obtained by the same Arthur Powell by a forged signature.

The applicant contended that the case did not fall within Regulation 24 (1) because Arthur Powell would have taken the certificates in any event, and therefore his act in handing them over did not contribute to the fraud. It is true that Arthur Powell's guiding principle seems to have been to steal whatever came in his way, but it is too much to ask me to assume as a certainty that the certificates would have been kept where Arthur, Powell could steal them and that he would have stolen them.

I hold, therefore, as I held in Alvis' case, that the act of the holder contributed towards and was one of the causes of the fraudulent treatment of the certificates and that he is not entitled to recover from the Postmaster-General as he seeks to do, if there was payment in good faith of the sum specified in the warrant to the person purporting to be the person named in the warrant.

The warrant in this case, in accordance with the request made on the application, was a warrant crossed and marked "Not negotiable payable through a bank. It was made out in the name of the holder and was presented through Barclay's Bank. It purports to be signed J. R. Powell," the holder's name and initials, but the signature does not bear the remotest resemblance to the specimen signature in the possession of the Money Order Department.

66

The evidence of the Post Office consisted of that of Miss V. M. M. Proper, who deposed that she compared the signature on the application for repayment with the recorded signature of the registered holder and initialled the form accordingly, and then passed it on for the issue of the warrant. The two signatures, in my opinion, are so much alike that Miss Proper was justified in passing the application and so far there is nothing in the procedure at the Post Office to disentitle the PostmasterGeneral to the protection of Regulation 24.

Before I discuss what happened subsequently it is necessary to examine a little more closely the provisions of the Regulations as to repayment, which are contained in Regulation 16.

There are three methods of repayment.

1. In the case of sums over 101. the warrant is presented at a post office together with the certificates, and the postmaster takes a receipt

Repayment, Disputed.

on the warrant from the person named as payee or any person purporting to be authorised by him to receive payment, and that receipt is a good discharge to the Postmaster-General. In this case there is not only the signed application, which can be compared at the head office with the recorded signature not an altogether satisfactory test, since the signature on the application, as in the present case, can be most efficiently forged at leisure but there is also the better test of a satisfactory signature signed in the presence of the postmaster, where forgery is much more difficult.

2. In the case of sums not exceeding 101. payment may be made to anyone who presents the warrant and the certificates, if the receipt on the warrant purports to be signed by the payee. This purported receipt is a discharge to the Postmaster-General. Here a looser practice is adopted and a certain amount of risk is run in the case of small amounts for the sake of convenience and the Postmaster-General obtains a discharge so long as the receipt merely purports to be signed by the payee.

3. Repayment may be by warrant payable only through a banker and in this case "the receipt on such warrant shall be signed by the person named thereon as payee." There is no question here of a receipt purporting to be signed by the payee. It must actually be signed by the payee, or the Postmaster-General does not get a good discharge. This provision resembles, so far as the payee is concerned, that laid down for the repayment of sums over 107.-naturally enough since it is to be presumed that repayments through a banker invariably or almost invariably are for sums exceeding 101. One would expect, therefore, to find in this case too, a safeguard resembling that provided by the signature of a receipt at the Post Office, and in fact this is provided by Regulation 16 (9), which is as follows:

"A Warrant payable only through a Banker and presented by or through a banker for payment will not (unless the PostmasterGeneral otherwise directs) be paid until after such Warrant has been examined by such officer as the Postmaster-General may from time to time direct."

This portion of the regulation, if carried out properly, would have enabled the forgery in the present case to be discovered before payment, but I find, to my considerable surprise, that it is not carried out at all. In 1915, in the case of warrants for dividends on the 4 per cent. war loan, the Postmaster-General arranged with the clearing banks to pay the warrants without previous examination, and if, on subsequent examination an error was discovered, that it should be adjusted then with the Bank by agreement with the Bank as an act of grace.

In 1917 without, I venture to think, sufficient consideration of the difference between the payment of small dividends on war loan and the repayment of comparatively large sums on war savings certificates, the same practice was extended to warrants in repayment of savings certificates, and it still continues in spite of the subsequent coming into existence of Regulation 16 (9). And not only is the examination made subsequently to payment but when it is made it only consists in an examination to see that the paid warrants have been receipted in the name as drawn. A case like the present would be passed by such an

Repayment, Disputed.

examination as this, with the result that, if the holder had not brought himself within Regulation 24 by his own act, the Postmaster-General would have obtained no discharge, since the warrant was not signed by the payee, and would have had to pay over again. If such a case arises, as it most probably will, I do not see at present what defence the Postmaster-General could have.

66

In fact, my opinion of the Postmaster-General's procedure in this matter resembles that which Nebuchadnezzar is said to have emitted while masticating "th' unwonted food "-"it may be wholesome, but it is not good." It may afford some sustenance to the Post Office by a saving of staff, but it seems to me to be unpalatably bad in law. Regulation 16 (9), in my opinion, does not mean that the PostmasterGeneral can give a general direction that that portion of the Regulation need not be complied with. The words are a warrant not" warrants.” It means that there is to be an examination before payment of any warrant, unless the Postmaster-General in any particular case, in his discretion exercised after proper consideration, otherwise directs. And it means that there is to be a proper examination, directed to the material point, namely whether the payee in fact signed the receipt, so that the Postmaster-General gets a good discharge, and this can only be carried out by a comparison of the signature on the warrant with the recorded signature of the holder.

The further question then remains-does the failure of the Post Office to comply with Regulation 16 (9) deprive it of the protection of Regulation 24 (1)? I think not. I think not. If there has been, as I think there has, a mistake, it has been made through a bona fide mistake of law, and payment can still be regarded as having been made in good faith in this case to the person purporting to be the person named in the warrant.

The application must therefore be dismissed, but whether, now that the defect has been pointed out, the defence under Regulation 24 (1) will still be available to the Post Office in a subsequent case, is a matter which I shall have to consider when the time comes.

Award that the application of Jack Rickwood Powell in the matter of savings certificates Nos. V. 500771, V. 364625, V. 364626 and X. 481114 be dismissed and that the fee for this award be remitted.

Transfer, Disputed.

Claim by former holder to certificates alleged to have been transferred by him into a fictitious name.

Robert Henry Parker. 25 certificates.

Hearing, 22nd September; Award, 24th November.

The certificates were claimed by X, a solicitor. They had stood in his name, but on December 19th, 1923, he signed a form as transferor, which he ordered his clerk to sign in the imaginary name of Robert Henry Parker as transferee. He himself witnessed this false signature in a false name, John Parker, of his own address, described as of no occupation, and in a disguised handwriting.

The Chief Registrar invited him to give a full explanation of the circumstances which led to this remarkable performance and on his declining to do so dismissed his application and sent the papers in the case to the Law Society.