RBS profit overshadowed by NatWest downtime

On the day that Royal Bank of Scotland reported its first quarterly profit in 12 years, the sweet taste of success has turned bitter for customers of subsidiary NatWest who have seen transfers from accounts vanish and mobile apps and online banking go dark.

Ongoing since 7.15 am, the calamity couldn't have come at a worse time, hitting on payday for thousands of customers and just as the UK enters a bank holiday weekend.

Customers took to Twitter to vent their frustration, reporting long queues before they could get to speak to someone.

Waiting time of 30 mins minimum to answer a call to @NatWest_Help because of more calls than usual Not surprised when the app isn't working
— John Boddy (@Bodders444) April 28, 2017

More troubling for other users is the disappearance of transfers from accounts.

#Natwest customers, DON'T transfer any money until they've sorted it out, i did and my money hasn't appeared. Very worrying @NatWest_Help
— Lauren Fleming (@LaurenFlemingRB) April 28, 2017

And the problem is not just confined to RBS-to-RBS account transfers

@NatWest_Help transferred money to someone else's account and it's disappeared. Is this part of your ongoing problem? It's to a HSBC account
— Jess Mc (@Jaymc193) April 28, 2017

NatWest has yet to set a timeline on a fix, stating merely:

We are aware of some issues with completing transfers on accounts, we are working hard to fix this. Sorry and thank you for your patience.
— NatWest (@NatWest_Help) April 28, 2017

Related Companies

NatWest Royal Bank of Scotland

Channels

Retail banking Payments

Keywords

Mobile & online banking

Comments: (4)

Steve Ellis - Finextra Research - London 28 April, 2017, 12:26

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I was wondering if this was a bit harsh on NatWest. Then I saw the list of Related Stories tagged below.

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Ketharaman Swaminathan - GTM360 Marketing Solutions - Pune 28 April, 2017, 13:40

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What's @Bodders444 complaining about? Across the pond, 30 minutes hold time is about average while trying to reach a service provider on the phone - when all's well. And when s**t hits the fan, as in the present case with NatWest, hold times as long two hours are not unheard of e.g. TARGET data breach. On a side note, this is another example of a customer using phone first to complain, then Twitter to rant. For the past several years, I've been following the reverse sequence and it works wonders - with most brands, I get my problem resolved within an hour on Twitter and have rarely had to pick up the phone.

Customers Of The World Unite, You Have Nothing To Lose But The Call Center Hold Music

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A Finextra member 28 April, 2017, 14:37

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You'd have thought that they would have disabled the payments/transfer function of their website or at the very least put a message on their website warning of the issue.

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Ketharaman Swaminathan - GTM360 Marketing Solutions - Pune 28 April, 2017, 15:10

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A bank disabling payment functionality? Especially when a system outage prevents money from being tranferred out of the bank?? No chance!!! #FloatIncome.