Westpac online banking systems operating after long disruption

Monday, 11 May 2020

Westpac has had a wide-spread systems failure preventing some customers from making payments.

Westpac's online banking systems were back in operation on Tuesday morning, after significant disruption on Monday.

The bank said it had suffered a 'widespread' systems failure that had affected online banking, card payments and its contact centre.

Westpac said some New Zealand Superannuation payments and beneficiary payments that were due to go out on Monday night were delayed by the issues, but should now be in people’s accounts.

The delays also extended to some customers of other banks, whose banks receive the government payments via Westpac.

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Westpac NZ general manager commercial, corporate and institutional banking Simon Power said staff worked through the night to fix the problem, which also affected online and mobile banking platforms.

“We know this is already a stressful time for many New Zealanders and we apologise for the inconvenience this has caused,” Power said,.

The bank's customers said they had been struggling to make payments and complete online banking transactions which has left customers fuming, including those trying to buy food.

They directed their anger and suggestions to the bank via Facebook, including suggesting that instead of transactions failing with a 'declined' message, the message could indicate the reason was not because the customer did not have the funds in their account.

'Seriously, it’s about time EFTPOS Systems were upgraded to report 'Westpac System Down' or something similar instead of the uninformative 'Declined',' customer Deklan Martin told the bank.

Pearl Davies posted: 'I’m so happy I’m not the only one I just waited 45 mins in the supermarket to pay for my shopping for it to be declined.'

Another shopper, Ria Mana, posted her frustration at not being told what was happening at around 3pm.

'So where is the update Westpac. It is shopping day and I have a house full of kids to feed and I can't pay for my shopping even tho' there is money in there. Not happy at all.'

Some customers tried to contact the bank by phone, but struggled to get through.

'After ringing the call centre and being told a five minute wait, it's been almost an hour,' Aurelia Rose posted. 'Phone banking isn't working, app isn't working and even your site won't load. I'm not happy at all.

'I have an urgent payment to make and I've been stressing for two goddam hours, tears and all. I switched to you guys literally a week before lockdown and boy am I regretting it.'

Other customers felt Westpac should have a system of text notifications to alert customers when its payment systems were down so they didn't head out to the shops.

Ioan Bramhall said: 'It would be helpful to be notified of this sort of issue. I have just driven 20km to the supermarket and can't shop. An estimated time would be useful.'

'Perhaps next time send a text, if possible, so we can plan around this as opposed to panicking?' said Audrey Hill.

Westpac responded saying it had been unable to send out text notifications too.

'Unfortunately our Contact Centre is down so we've been unable to notify people. We're working on it though!' the bank posted on its Facebook account.