PTSB apologises as salaries fail to land in accounts on Black Friday

PTSB customers expressed frustration on Friday after a “technical issue” meant salaries did not land in their accounts on one of the busiest shopping days of the year.

The bank apologised after the issue led to payments from employers and pension providers not showing up in customer accounts.

Shortly after lunchtime, the bank said it had resolved the payments delays for the majority of customers, “and we continue to work to resolve this issue for any remaining customers as a priority”.

There were also issues with its app and customers were later advised to revert to its website which was “up and running”.

However, the system failure was bad timing for the bank as it fell on Black Friday, a date in the calendar when retailers offer consumers cut-price deals in an effort to generate publicity.

“That kind of service is not acceptable,” said Michael Kilcoyne, chairman of the Consumers’ Association of Ireland. “It’s a perfect example of how you can be left without any money and if you plan to go shopping on Black Friday, it’s not good enough.”

It is understood PTSB was one of at least 10 banks across Europe affected by the issue involving an external service.

“Due to a technical issue with a third-party payments provider, some customers may be experiencing delays when sending or receiving Sepa payments,” it said in a statement on Friday morning.

The Sepa, or Single Euro Payments Area, system came into force in 2014 creating a single market for euro retail payments and allowing cashless transfers to payees located in any member state.

“All other PTSB services are operating as normal. We are working hard to resolve the issue and expect it to be resolved for the majority of customers by midmorning,” the bank had said.

“We apologise for any inconvenience caused and will provide further updates via our website, social media and mobile app throughout the day.”

However, that reassurance was not sufficient to quell much of the customer irritation exercised in online responses.

“Still can’t get in,” one user posted in response to the bank’s messages, at 3.20pm. “My wages weren’t there first thing this morning when the app was still working. Dreadful service.”

Despite ongoing assurances via social media, many customers remained frustrated at the inconsistent service provision.

“App is still not working, dreadful customer service be honest … stop saying it’s working,” another said.

Such service outages are often an issue for customers. Earlier this year Bank of Ireland, which has had a number of IT problems and glitches in recent years, saw online and mobile banking suffer an hours-long outage due to a technical fault.

Sign up for the Business Today newsletter and get the latest business news and commentary in your inbox every weekday morningOpt in to Business push alerts and have the best news, analysis and comment delivered directly to your phoneJoin The Irish Times on WhatsApp and stay up to dateOur Inside Business podcast is published weekly – Find the latest episode here