Customers of several major UK financial institutions experienced disruptions on Tuesday after a power-related incident at a Google Cloud data centre near London affected digital services across multiple businesses.
The outage affected services provided by digital bank Revolut, while traditional lenders Lloyds and HSBC also reported problems with their banking platforms. Other businesses, including property website Rightmove and postal operator Royal Mail, were also among those receiving reports of service disruptions.
Google confirmed that the incident began at 0608 GMT on Tuesday, attributing the disruption to a power event at its cloud infrastructure facility in London. In a service update, the technology company said it was working to restore normal operations and initially expected a full recovery at about 1300 GMT.
The company had earlier warned that several services in its London region were experiencing technical problems. “Multiple Google Cloud services are experiencing elevated errors and intermittent network failures in europe-west2 region,” Google said in an update.
The affected region, identified as europe-west2, serves customers through Google Cloud infrastructure based in London. Cloud computing providers supply businesses with online infrastructure and computing services that support applications, data storage and other digital operations.
For Revolut customers, the disruption affected several banking functions, including ATM withdrawals, bank transfers and card top-ups. A source close to the matter attributed the problems to the Google Cloud outage.
In response to the incident, a Revolut spokesperson said the company had been working to resolve the problem since it was identified. The spokesperson also apologised to customers affected by the disruption.
“We can confirm that all our customers’ money and data are safe,” the spokesperson said, addressing concerns about the security of customer funds and information.
Lloyds also acknowledged that some customers were unable to use its digital banking services as expected. The lender said it was aware that “some customers are having issues with our app and online banking”.
HSBC similarly reported problems with access to its services. The bank confirmed that customers were experiencing “difficulties accessing our services” and said it would “monitor the situation, which is also affecting other organisations”.
Reports recorded by internet service tracker Downdetector indicated that the disruption extended beyond banking. Hundreds of users reported problems involving several businesses, including Rightmove and Royal Mail, although the reports alone did not establish that every reported problem had the same cause.
The incident highlights the dependence of many businesses on cloud computing infrastructure operated by a relatively small number of technology providers. Banks and other companies use cloud services to support digital platforms, process information and maintain online services, meaning technical failures at an infrastructure provider can affect multiple organisations at the same time.
For customers, interruptions to digital banking can temporarily prevent access to everyday services such as transferring money, adding funds to cards and managing accounts through mobile applications. Such disruptions can also affect businesses that depend on online platforms to communicate with customers or provide services.
Google’s initial recovery estimate indicated that the company expected to restore affected services by around 1300 GMT on Tuesday. However, the available information did not confirm whether every affected business had returned to normal operations by that time.
The company had not provided further details in the supplied updates about the precise cause of the power event or the full extent of its impact. The incident also did not, on the information available, indicate that customer funds or personal data had been compromised.
