CSNA calls on Central Bank to probe payment outage

CSNA CEO Vincent Jennings has asked the Committee to consider establishing “clearing house” or “sorting office”, possibly run by local Chambers that would help retailers to report crime and share evidence with An Garda Siochana

CSNA CEO Vincent Jennings described the disruption caused at supermarkets, convenience stores and forecourts as "truly extensive"

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The Convenience Stores and Newsagents Association (CSNA) has called on the Central Bank to investigate after a payment system outage caused major disruption for customers and shop staff.

An eight-hour outage at card payments company Opayo caused “extensive” problems in supermarkets, convenience stores and petrol forecourts.

CSNA chief executive Vincent Jennings called on the Central Bank to seek a report into the outage, which impacted the SuperValu network of shops among other retailers.

“There was an eight-hour outage of one of the largest payment service providers, Opayo, formerly Elavon and SagePay,” Jennings said.

“The disruption in supermarkets and convenience and forecourts was truly extensive.”

Mr Jennings said that in-store ATMs continued to function with payment cards that did not work on check-outs. This meant some could withdraw cash to pay for their purchases.

Others, who do not have debit or credit cards, tried to pay at check-outs using payment systems on their phones and smart watches. However, shoppers could not get the phones to work, and phones and watches cannot access cash from ATMs.

“Retailers lost sales and credit had to be given to other customers, with the hope now that they will pay up,” Jennings added.

“I’ve asked the Central Bank to assure me that they are seeking a report and to confirm they are aware the Opayo system went down at the same time throughout the UK.”

Jennings said it was the third outage that occurred in four weeks.

Opayo, which has around 50,000 customers in Ireland and is owned by Elavon, confirmed it “encountered an issue” which has impacted the processing of transactions.

The company said the issue has now been resolved, and it apologised for what happened.

“We can confirm the issue is now resolved and normal service is restored,” Opayo said. “We continue to monitor the service closely.”

“Thank you for your patience during this service interruption to your business, for which we again apologise.”

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