RBS group online and mobile banking services down

RBS (LSE: RBS.L - news) customers across the banking group's three outlets have been left locked out their accounts as they tried to access online banking or mobile apps.

The group has apologised as customers at its Royal Bank of Scotland, Natwest and Ulster Banks were left locked out their accounts when they tried to access its online banking or mobile app.

The problem was initially thought to be a glitch affecting only Natwest customers, but later emerged as being widespread across the RBS banking group.

The group has around 8 million online and mobile customers across the three brands.

It said customers can still access their accounts through telephone banking or use high street ATMs.

RBS chief executive Ross McEwan said: "We are still working through what the issue is - absolute apologies to customers…"

He pointed to changes being made to accounts "on an ongoing basis" as one possible explanation for the outage.

"The team are working very hard to get it back up for our customers… every so often we do have difficulties," he told radio station LBC (Shanghai: 600727.SS - news) .

He insisted that the number of such incidents has "dropped dramatically" from 300 in 2014 to 20 last year, and that his team was working "flat out".

"We feel the pain of our customers every time this happens," he said.

Mr McEwan said he would not make any promises about how quickly the service would be back.

He added: "It is up 99 point something per cent of the time and it is used more than ever."

The glitch comes a day after some Barclays (LSE: BARC.L - news) customers were left struggling to log into their accounts due to a technical problem.

But RBS is in fact the fourth financial services firm to suffer an outage this week, with Barclays, the Co-operative
Bank and fintech Cashplus all apologising to their customers for disruptions to their services.

The pressure on retail banks to bolster their technology infrastructure has been heightened in recent years as they have proceeded with cutting down on high street branches, making customers increasingly reliant on digital services to manage their finances.

The consequences of technical hitches have become more severe as a result.

Earlier this year a major outage at mid-sized lender TSB, owned by Spain's Sabadell, left thousands of customers
unable to access their money or make vital payments for long periods.

The bank's most recent tech meltdown last month ended in the departure of its chief executive Paul Pester , after seven years in the role.

In July, the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority set a deadline of 5 October for British banks to explain how they can avoid damaging IT breakdowns and respond to the growing threat of cyber attacks.