Australian bank customers faced a major industry-wide payment transfer outage, causing online transfers through Osko and the New Payments Platform to sit in limbo.
Payments made between and 7.21pm and 11.47pm AEDT on Wednesday night were either delayed or not sent.
These services are now restored and are processing at full capacity, while the RBA is working with the banks to clear the backlog of payments.
The RBA has since issued an apology to Australians, claiming the error occurred during a planned change to the software that manages the Reserve Bank’s virtual servers, which disrupted a number of production servers.
"We sincerely apologise to industry participants and customers for the inconvenience and disruption caused," said Michele Bullock, RBA Deputy Governor.
"It was disappointing that this occurred and we recognise the impact this would have on people relying on the payments system.
"I want to assure people that the Bank takes the stability of the payments infrastructure very seriously and will double its effort to ensure this does not happen again."
The New Payments Platform - of which Osko is a part - was developed in 2018 by the RBA in conjunction with BPAY and several retail banks, and allows near real-time payments between parties.
Most banks participate in the NPP, with notable exceptions including Adelaide Bank, AMP, Heritage Bank, HSBC, ME Bank, RACQ Bank, and RaboBank.
Advertisement
Need somewhere to store cash and earn interest? The table below features savings accounts with some of the highest interest rates on the market.
All products with a link to a product provider’s website have a commercial marketing relationship between us and these providers. These products may appear prominently and first within the search tables regardless of their attributes and may include products marked as promoted, featured or sponsored. The link to a product provider’s website will allow you to get more information or apply for the product.
By de-selecting “Show online partners only” additional non-commercialised products may be displayed and re-sorted at the top of the table. For more information on how we’ve selected these “Sponsored”, “Featured” and “Promoted” products, the products we compare, how we make money, and other important information about our service, please click here. Rates correct as of July 27, 2024. View disclaimer.