Metro Bank faces brief payment outage with duplicated transactions

Metro Bank experienced a short disruption to its payment services on Tuesday morning that temporarily left some customers unable to send or receive money and, in some cases, showing duplicated transactions and negative balances. The bank said the problem began in the early hours and produced a spike in outage reports between about 8am and 10am, although some users reported issues from shortly after 6am.

Customers posting on social media described payments appearing twice in accounts, with both pending and cleared entries for the same transactions, and some people reporting that this had put them into overdraft or prevented them from making transfers. One customer said a partner working long hours could not access funds to buy food, and others said they were unable to complete payments for rent or travel. Several users also reported longer-than-usual waits when contacting the bank by phone.

Metro Bank acknowledged the disruption on its service status page and on social media. A Metro Bank spokesperson said, "We experienced a short delay affecting inbound and outbound payments earlier this morning. This was resolved and customers can currently make payments as usual. Some...