The Bank of England has reported a "global payments issue" that has delayed high-value transactions, including house purchases, processed through its national real-time gross settlement system, CHAPS.
CHAPS is essential for processing large, time-sensitive payments, such as transfers for football player purchases, art transactions, and home completions. It faced a six-hour outage in August of the previous year, and typically handles more than £300 billion in payments each day.
The global payments issue appears to be connected to difficulties with the SWIFT financial messaging network. The Bank is acutely aware of the potential impact of this issue and is collaborating closely with a third-party supplier, industry participants, and relevant authorities to resolve it as quickly as possible.
In the meantime, the Bank recommends that consumers and businesses reach out to their banks or payment service providers if they have concerns about specific payments. They have also noted that retail payment systems remain unaffected, allowing people and businesses to continue using cash points, card payments, and bank transfers without interruption.
This incident marks the third significant technical failure affecting the Bank of England’s critical bank-to-bank payments infrastructure in the last decade. Following a ten-hour CHAPS breakdown in 2014, the Bank was instructed to enhance its contingency arrangements and crisis management strategies. A 2019 report by a Commons Select Committee criticized the Bank for its outdated technology, prompting a broader multi-year initiative to modernize the RTGS service, including the introduction of a new core settlement engine that was slated for a summer rollout.
Update: In a statement regarding the recent six-hour outage, the Bank of England has confirmed that the third-party supplier has restored services and CHAPS payments are now processing normally. They anticipate that all payments received by the Bank today will be settled before the end of the day.