Key facts
- A power grid disruption in the UK affected Worldpay, a major payment processing platform.
- Customers experienced issues with card and contactless payments at various businesses, including Tesco.
- The outage led to long queues at cash machines and some venues reverting to cash-only payments.
- Worldpay's technical teams worked to resolve the intermittent transaction authorization issues.
- Tesco confirmed the payment issue was resolved.
A widespread card payment outage impacted numerous pubs and shops across the UK on Tuesday, coinciding with a major football match. The disruption was attributed to a power grid issue affecting Worldpay, one of the world's largest payment processing platforms.
Customers reported difficulties with contactless payments at various businesses, including multiple Tesco branches. Social media videos depicted long queues forming outside cash machines as consumers sought alternative payment methods. Some pubs and entertainment venues announced on social media that they were temporarily only accepting cash.
A spokesperson for Worldpay stated that a third-party power disruption was causing intermittent transaction authorization issues and tokenization request errors on some of its platforms. The company's technical teams were actively working to address the matter and restore full service.
Downdetector, a website monitoring online service outages, indicated over 1,000 customer reports of issues with Tesco payments since 8 p.m. Tesco later confirmed that the payment issue affecting its stores and online services had been resolved and apologized for the inconvenience caused.