Lloyds and Halifax banks were hit by service outages today after Barclays customers saw major problems over the weekend. The high street banks, which are part of the same company, saw problems spike at around 7am and last for around three hours, though both are now running again as normal. Users said they have had issues making and receiving payments, with some saying they had not received their salaries and had payments due to be debited.

It comes after a major outage hit Barclays on Friday and carried into the weekend, which the bank said was a ‘technology issue’ and left many customers unable to access funds or make payments. According to service monitoring website Downdetector, hundreds of people reported problems with Lloyds and Halifax this morning. Lloyds replied to customers raising concerns on social media, apologising for the problems and saying they were working to fix it, though they did not say what was causing it.

In response to one customer on X, Lloyds said: ‘We know some customers are having issues making or receiving payments. We’re sorry for this and are working to have everything back to normal.’. One customer wrote to them: ‘@LloydsBank we are now massively overdrawn as payments have gone out but all our standing orders paying money in haven’t gone arrived – assume you aren’t going to charge us penalties for this when it’s your system that is broken?!!’.

Halifax posted an identical reply to customers who made direct complaints to its official account on social media. As banks rely more and more on technology, with in-person banking increasingly a thing of the past, such issues are only set to become more widespread. Financial technology expert Chris Skinner said the vast array of cyber systems now needed meant banks have ‘such a smorgasbord of things they have to work with’ that the ‘competence of keeping up with these changes is really challenging every bank’.

Barclays customers had a nightmare over this weekend, with users saying they were unable to pay bills, or they didn’t dare to fill up their cars. One Metro reader named Marcus told us he needed to put shopping back on the shelves at the Co-op when his debit card and ApplePay account both failed. He added: ‘I needed fuel for my car but was too scared to fill up then not be able to pay so I have only done limited mileage this weekend.’.

There were scenes of people flooding to branches and ATMs, with rumours of ‘free cash’ being shared on X and TiKTok, though the bank said any money withdrawn would be debited. In a statement yesterday, Barclays said the issues were now resolved: ‘We’re very sorry for all the issues our customers faced.’. They said that a ‘technology issue’ had caused the problems, though did not elaborate further on what this involved.

‘Everything is now working as it should be,’ the bank said in a statement. However, they warned that some customers could still experience knock-on delays because so many people are getting in touch, leaving teams ‘very busy’ trying to respond. ‘To save you waiting, please use our app, Online Banking and automated telephone service, if at all possible,’ they said. And they issued a warning that scammers seize on times like this as they know customers will be worried: ‘We’d never ask for your account details or to click on any links in a text message – please stay vigilant and don’t share any personal information.’.

The bank reassured customers that they intend to ‘put every customer back to their original financial position’ if they have been out of pocket due to the problems, and that they should get in touch. They added that anyone who has sent a duplicate payment in error should ‘speak to the person you paid and ask them to return any extra payments, if you haven’t already’. Got a story? Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. Or you can submit your videos and pictures here.

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