Post Office expects to have paid more than £650m in Horizon claims by March

Toby Jones plays as Alan Bates in the ITV drama Mr Bates vs the Post Office. Photograph: ITV/Rex/Shutterstock

The Post Office expects to have paid out more than £650m in compensation to branch owner-operators by next March, after the ITV series about the Horizon IT scandal resulted in a huge spike in claims, the inquiry has heard.

Simon Recaldin, the head of the four redress schemes the Post Office runs, told the public inquiry into the scandal that the state-owned body had so far paid out £302m after the hundreds of wrongful prosecutions that were based on evidence from the flawed IT system.