Thousands hit by Bank of Scotland systems failure

Thousands of companies have been hit by a computer breakdown in the Bank of Scotland's international business division.

The bank's business customers were unable to pay their overseas suppliers, with hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of transactions being delayed. Inward payments are still being affected.

The Bank of Scotland admitted that there have been problems for more than two weeks with electronic payments being made from its Edinburgh-based division, but claimed they would be resolved by the end of the day (Friday).

A spokeswoman for the bank said: "We have experienced operational problems with a new computer system for international payments over the past two weeks. This has resulted in delays in the Bank's international payment traffic and a backlog over the past 10 days."

She added that all outward payments should now be running as normal and "inward payments would be resolved before the weekend".

The Bank of Scotland has also said that any customers who are out of pocket as a result of the breakdown will be compensated.

The spokeswoman was unable to give specific details about the nature of the problems. Why not? [Andy]

link at

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-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), August 30, 1999

Answers

"As I understand it, Mr. Kemp is simply suggesting we take precautionary measures to provide an anchor for our currency and all the world currencies that wish to link with the dollar in order to simplify financial transactions and record-keeping. The simple fact of the matter is that the global banking network, which not long ago relied on calculators and pen-and-ink ledgers, is now completely reliant on computers. "Money" is now largely electronic. Even if our financial markets are the most Y2K compliant in the world, a breakdown anywhere in this incredibly complex system may feed back to us in ways we cannot foresee or imagine. We need to think through what steps we can take right now to ensure the integrity of this system."

Dan Quayle...

At least one of 'em is a GI...

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), August 30, 1999.

Dan!

If you're lurking, why not stop by and say "Helloe" ?

-- jor-el (jor-el@krypton.uni), August 30, 1999.

You just can't predict WHO'S going to GI, can you? LOL

-- Will continue (farming@home.com), August 30, 1999.