Barclays down: Customers locked out of online banking accounts amid major outage problems

Barclays customers have been unable to log in to their accounts and get through on the phone after the bank suffered a major outage.

The issues have been affecting the Barclays website and telephone banking services on Thursday, though the bank said its mobile phone app was working as normal.

A spokeswoman for Barclays said they were working to fix the problems.

"We're currently experiencing some technical problems - customers are still able to use Barclays mobile banking app to check their balance, make and receive payments,” she said.

Some of Barclays’ customers have vented their frustration on Twitter.

One user said: "It is driving me mad at the moment."

Another tweeted: "Their phone lines are down and online banking not working... thanks guys!"

The banking giant’s UK customers were greeted with the message: "5 - Sorry - Barclays Online Banking is currently unavailable".

Barclays has been responding to concerned customers on social media – acknowledging the issue and saying it hopes its systems will be up and running again soon.

A member of the bank’s social media team reassured one customer following a complaint, writing: “Hey Zebre, we're experiencing some issues at the moment :( We're hoping to be back up and running very soon so that you can pay your rent.”

A statement published to Twitter advised customers to use the mobile app to access their accounts.

"If you're unable to access Online Banking, Telephone Banking, or use some features in our app, we're sorry," the statement read.

"You can still make payments and check your balance in our Mobile Banking app as normal. We're looking into the problem now, and we'll update you here as soon as possible. Thanks for bearing with us."

Barclays website also noted issues with online baking, telephone banking and branches.

A status update for its telephone banking service read: "We're sorry, you won't be able to speak to us right now – we're working to fix a problem with this service."

The latest banking problems follow TSB's huge IT meltdown earlier this year, following a botched IT switch which saw customers locked out of their accounts.