Ulster Bank Systems are down *READ* Mod post #291

ScouseMouse

giant_midget wrote: »

Im not a UB customer im an AIB customer that has not got paid this morning, Does anyone habe an email address for UB CS dept? The sly rats seem to have taken this info from their website..

With all due respect......

What the hell do you want that for? Its all over the international news, its all over the internet and all over boards. Thousands of people have been put out, I am sure people have been caught without groceries and petrol.

While it may make you feel better firing off a stinker of an email, what's the point ???

There is absolutely nothing they can do about it. I have no doubt whatsoever, they would like it to work, but giving them grief by email (or any other way), is pointless and uncalled for.

Its costing them millions and it doesn't take an einstein to know that.

If you want to express your outrage, ring Joe, that fecking ejit would probably be horrified at your prediciment:rolleyes:

All you can do is sit tight and wait for it to come back, or go into a branch and see if they can help you.

liamo

jhegarty wrote: »

Sounds a lot more like a simple database collapse to me.

An earlier poster hit the nail on the head, I believe, when he suggested that it might be a single server that had ad-hoc, undocumented mods made over a period of time. If they neglected to make a nightly image of the server from which to recover in the event of a major failure then they have to build the server from scratch. Not a prospect I would relish.

A failure like that could be as as result of hardware failure, a damaged filesystem, a damaged database, a rogue employee, malware, an attack of some kind, etc. Hopefully it's nothing more sinister than a simple, explainable failure.

On the other hand if, as suggested by a couple of posters, there have been problems for a while that have been getting worse, it could be a problem in one or more processing applications. If it's been going on for a couple of weeks it makes the current state of the data untrusted. That could have the same effect as a downed server in that they might pull some systems offline in order to rebuild the data.

I assume that they have some kind of data backup (even if they do have to rebuild the server) that is performed on a regular basis, in which case they can recover the system to a point in time that they know is accurate. Even if the backup is only hours old, the amount of data that they process could make it difficult to bring the system back to a current and accurate state. And, of course, everything has to be checked and rechecked. If they go back online with inaccurate data, it's going be even harder to recover from that.

I'm sure they will learn from this and they will take steps to never be placed in this position again. I hope the other banks are better prepared and/or are learning from this.

msg11

I'm actully so confused about this, is the balance I am seening now how much is actully in my account. It say my last transaction was on the 20th ATM WITHDRAWAL 50 and I am nearly sure I didn't use my card after that date. So would that be an up to date balance?

Also, my money hasn't gone into the account will my employer have to do anything?

I'm a little worried about using my card if the balance is not accurate.

What in the name of god are they doing to fix this problem? There's not just a few people affected it's millions of people and two countries affected they really need to get the finger out.

Thanks be to god I am going away next weekend and not this weekend be totally screwed for money as I hate carrying cash around with me.

On a side issue have these banks got no redundancy built into there networks? When I was doing the CCNA course, all our redundancy models where mimicking bank networks.

Richard Epos

Glenbhoy wrote: »

My understanding is that you can spend up to what you were allowed to spend as of Tuesday past as no transactions have been processed since then.
In other words, if you had €1000 available between funds and overdraft facilty on Tuesday, then you still have that much available (can anyone clarify if cash withdrawals/lodgements are reflected in current balances (i'm loathe to write updated).

Also, someone else mentioned that this may have been a problem getting progressively worse over the past few weeks and imo balances have been looking a bit strange and eft's have been taking longer to process than they normally would. For example, i have had payments showing up on my account, but not available for several days after they normally would have been over the past 2-3 weeks.

Ive have loads of "Weird" looking stuff on my statement as of 28th May, Purchase made on Debit card on the 26th of May, Money taken from my account on the 4th of June, Loads of Delays in the money being deducted from my account, which in turn, Leaves me to believe ive more money than i do in the account. I was that bad at one stage, I went to UB and asked them to print me out a statement for the last month because I thought i'd been skimmed

szjon

This is a nail in the coffin for the cashless society ideal.

rameire

msg11 wrote: »

What in the name of god are they doing to fix this problem? There's not just a few people affected it's millions of people and two countries affected they really need to get the finger out.

eh.
they are twiddling their thumbs.
or they are having a cup of tea.

szjon

Richard Epos wrote: »

Ive have loads of "Weird" looking stuff on my statement as of 28th May, Purchase made on Debit card on the 26th of May, Money taken from my account on the 4th of June, Loads of Delays in the money being deducted from my account, which in turn, Leaves me to believe ive more money than i do in the account. I was that bad at one stage, I went to UB and asked them to print me out a statement for the last month because I thought i'd been skimmed

We need to get those who saw this happening in the preceeding weeks together somehow. I reported this to the branch manager weeks ago. When I called in today to remind him he told me it was an isolated incident and my case was my own fault, (again). We will be able to fight as a team to recover lost money. I'm only out 18 euro but it's MY 18 euro and I know I was not at fault.

I did see a flash of fear in his eyes though when I told him he was partly responsible. that they were quibbling over a 4.40 euro charge and failed to notify the I.T. dept of a small gremlin that is now an epic fail. :mad:

Any suggestions on how we can group together to corroborate our experiences? They are still ignorant of or denying the fact.

Mr.Crinklewood

Ulster bank say people that were meant to be paid today, will get the money over the weekend.

Branches open until 1500 tomorrow.

Cause was a "software glitch"

Update shortly on Newstalk.

Source Newstalk.

Mr.Crinklewood

szjon wrote: »

We need to get those who saw this happening in the preceeding weeks together somehow. I reported this to the branch manager weeks ago. When I called in today to remind him he told me it was an isolated incident and my case was my own fault, (again). We will be able to fight as a team to recover lost money. I'm only out 18 euro but it's MY 18 euro and I know I was not at fault.

I did see a flash of fear in his eyes though when I told him he was partly responsible. that they were quibbling over a 4.40 euro charge and failed to notify the I.T. dept of a small gremlin that is now an epic fail. :mad:

Any suggestions on how we can group together to corroborate our experiences? They are still ignorant of or denying the fact.

Maybe get #ulsterbankissue threading on twitter?

msg11

rameire wrote: »

eh.
they are twiddling their thumbs.
or they are having a cup of tea.

In all fairness as an UB customer I don't really find that comment funny at all. I'm sitting here with no money, they have had days to fix this issue and can't even figure out when normal service will be back.

Mr.Crinklewood

Recorded interview on Newstalk now.

"Focus on customers"

Number of branches open until 3PM tomorrow, may open Sunday.

Caused by software patch.

Delays in resolution due to manual processing.

Blaming RBS.

pfurey101

Mr.Crinklewood wrote: »

Maybe get #ulsterbankissue threading on twitter?

Wot??? You want to crash Twitter also

Anyone see the conspiracy nutters? The RBS is done, no money there, ready to close etc. they forget to mention that the RBS is more than (freeman) 80% owned by the British gov.

msg11

Payment over the weekend are they having me on? Jesus if I went OD on my account I would have a service charge within seconds, my weekend is ruined I have no money and don't want to touch my account in case they start trying to scheme me out of money.

All we get for this is a sorry oh yeah and then them banking charges they want to bring in, I tell ye something for nothing, I won't be hanging around with them if they bring in any charges for this mayhem.

Glenbhoy

szjon wrote: »

We need to get those who saw this happening in the preceeding weeks together somehow. I reported this to the branch manager weeks ago. When I called in today to remind him he told me it was an isolated incident and my case was my own fault, (again). We will be able to fight as a team to recover lost money. I'm only out 18 euro but it's MY 18 euro and I know I was not at fault.

I did see a flash of fear in his eyes though when I told him he was partly responsible. that they were quibbling over a 4.40 euro charge and failed to notify the I.T. dept of a small gremlin that is now an epic fail. :mad:

Any suggestions on how we can group together to corroborate our experiences? They are still ignorant of or denying the fact.

I'm pretty sure that I haven't lost anything, but I definitely noticed pretty much exactly the sort of thing that Richard mentioned, even cash withdrawals which were always virtually instantaneous were not processing for a few days.

Richard Epos

Just Received this there now via E-MAIL....


Thank you for using eFlow.

We wish to inform you that your recent card payment failed when presented to the bank for processing. All eFlow accounts must have a valid payment method. If you have recently been issued with a new banking card please update these details with us.

As a valued eFlow customer, we would like to remind you that an expired card will result in account suspension and your toll journeys being charged at the unregistered rate.

Please note that if you have an eFlow tag account your tag(s) will become inactive on all toll roads during account suspension.

szjon

Glenbhoy wrote: »

I'm pretty sure that I haven't lost anything, but I definitely noticed pretty much exactly the sort of thing that Richard mentioned, even cash withdrawals which were always virtually instantaneous were not processing for a few days.

My experience was ebay/paypal transactions, I use them on a daily basis and have had no issues in 3 years. The available balance would always reduce by whatever I paid, weekends, anytime. Made payment, available balance reduced. Transaction would appear a day or so later. What started to happen was the available balance was not reducing, this caused me to pay for something that my available balance said I could afford, then when it updated 2 days later I was overdrawn and charged. This is not possible on my student account, I queried the charges at my branch and was told it was my fault and that transactions took a few days to clear. They were not listening and I took it all the way to the manager. I was in the branch for over an hour. they just didn't want to refund the 4.40 euro.

Next my car insurance was due, I checked the available balance, all was well, then when it updated the next day it had been refused and a 12.70 charge applied.

I was recieving goods I ordered from ebay UK before my available balance or transactions history were updating, we're talking 5 days in some instances.

Then it stopped working midweek altogether.

I checked with paypal, they recieved payment as usual and were sure the issue was not with them. i don't believe this is a coincidence. There are similar stories surfacing for natwest customers in the UK.

ScouseMouse

giant_midget wrote: »

Im not a UB customer im an AIB customer that has not got paid this morning, Does anyone habe an email address for UB CS dept? The sly rats seem to have taken this info from their website..

The repercussions of this will be wide ranging. I have no doubt they will sort it out, but they have to find whats causing it first.

Then there will be the refunding of people who have been hit with charges for bouncing / refused debits / missed payments. This will go on for months.

One good thing about it is people cannot be held responsible for a bank failure. It cannot go on any credit records. I dont think anyone in the UK or Ireland will be unaware of this failure.

Glenbhoy

szjon wrote: »

My experience was ebay/paypal transactions, I use them on a daily basis and have had no issues in 3 years. The available balance would always reduce by whatever I paid, weekends, anytime. Made payment, available balance reduced. Transaction would appear a day or so later. What started to happen was the available balance was not reducing, this caused me to pay for something that my available balance said I could afford, then when it updated 2 days later I was overdrawn and charged. This is not possible on my student account, I queried the charges at my branch and was told it was my fault and that transactions took a few days to clear. They were not listening and I took it all the way to the manager. I was in the branch for over an hour. they just didn't want to refund the 4.40 euro.

Next my car insurance was due, I checked the available balance, all was well, then when it updated the next day it had been refused and a 12.70 charge applied.

I was recieving goods I ordered from ebay UK before my available balance or transactions history were updating, we're talking 5 days in some instances.

Then it stopped working midweek altogether.

I checked with paypal, they recieved payment as usual and were sure the issue was not with them. i don't believe this is a coincidence. There are similar stories surfacing for natwest customers in the UK.

I was seeing transactions on my account statement that were not reflected in the available balance in a similar way that an uncleared cheque would appear. These were transactions which normally processed instantaneously such as cash withdrawals and EFT lodgements into my account, by way of example my wife is currently receiving maternity benefit, it is supposed to be paid on a Monday and but normally hits the account on a friday evening, this week, it was showing on the statement from Friday evening, but it was Monday evening before the funds were available to use.

ScouseMouse

msg11 wrote: »

Payment over the weekend are they having me on? Jesus if I went OD on my account I would have a service charge within seconds, my weekend is ruined I have no money and don't want to touch my account in case they start trying to scheme me out of money.

All we get for this is a sorry oh yeah and then them banking charges they want to bring in, I tell ye something for nothing, I won't be hanging around with them if they bring in any charges for this mayhem.

Can you get into a branch with ID? They may be able to help you. Try it.

There is a hospital next to me and the staff are queued out the door getting cash on the basis UB are processing their wages.

BuffyBot

I've just had spend part of my lunch hour doing a massive clean up of this thread.

This means I am not a happy camper..

a) Keep the posts constructive and civil.
b) Keep them on topic
c) Do not respond on thread to a post which you feel is unacceptable
d) Report any such posts
e) Retaliation is just as bad as instigating: i.e. "he started it" is not a defence. Drag the thread off topic, even in reply to a post by someone else will lead to deletion/infraction/bans
f) Anyone who falls foul of the above will get short shift.

oscarBravo

I just went into the branch with Her Indoors to get a few quid out for the weekend. I got money from the ATM, but she hadn't received her salary, so we headed inside to take some money from the savings account.

It was pretty surreal: their counter systems seem to be completely offline, so they couldn't look up account numbers. I ended up using the Android online banking app to look up the account number and show her the balance, at which point she cheerfully forked over the money, recording the whole transaction on the sort of manual transaction slip I haven't seen used for the better part of a decade.



I wonder how much we'll get to hear about the actual mechanism behind this disaster. The word is that a software patch had unintended consequences and caused all sorts of problems: how the hell did that patch get past software QA? I've been guilty of pushing flakey software into a live system myself from time to time, but not on a bloody bank mainframe.

Last I heard these systems were running on an IBM Z-series. I've never worked directly on that sort of big iron, but I've worked with I-series midrange kit, and when something like this goes wrong, it just ain't funny.

Lia_lia

It says my credit card payment (which I paid on Wednesday) still hasn't gone through. Which makes it past the due date for a payment...I hope they don't charge me.


Also my wages were supposed to go through today, and my internet banking is showing that nothing went in. Great.

2qk4u

a statement from the Ulster Bank parent company – Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) – says problems affecting Ulster Bank customers will continue until Monday at the earliest.

Whats the chances of mistakes being made ? If I bought something with my card in the middle of this mess could it be missed ?

cookie1977

Lia_lia wrote: »

It says my credit card payment (which I paid on Wednesday) still hasn't gone through. Which makes it past the due date for a payment...I hope they don't charge me.


Also my wages were supposed to go through today, and my internet banking is showing that nothing went in. Great.

If they do charge you they've said they will refund any out of pocket expenses caused by the UB failure

GoodisonPark

Mrs Shark went in to UB in Drogheda at lunchtime , produced her ID and payslip.
She asked for €700 cash , they would only give her €500 :mad:

barry181091

IBM don't have the contract to manage their servers anyway, and they are damn glad right now that they don't!

msg11

2qk4u wrote: »

Whats the chances of mistakes being made ? If I bought something with my card in the middle of this mess could it be missed ?

Doubt it, everything is been logged. It's just not filtering down at all, basically my jist of it is there's a big error between the front end stuff (cash machines, balances) and backend stuff (accounts, funding in and out etc..). But all the data is there, but just out of sync with each other. So when there back in sync funds will go in and out as normal, charges debited etc.. On a the **** up scale I would rate it at a 10..

I'm just worried, is the balance I am seeing now the real balance or an old update, don't want to be spending money I don't have !

cookie1977

HSE sent out email to staff saying they non-Ulster Bank customers are due to receive payment on Saturday 23rd. Those who are UB customer should get money by Monday 25th.

HSE staff update on Ulster Bank





Update from Ulster Bank
As you know, and despite best efforts, this morning Ulster Bank is still experiencing IT issues resulting in delays in updating customer balances and processing automated payments. As a result, Ulster Bank systems cannot currently be accessed by the HSE and there is a delay with payments being processed. Ulster Bank apologise unreservedly for this.

Over the weekend Ulster Bank will endeavour to clear the backlog of automated payments to ensure our customers' balances are up-to-date and that we are operational on Monday. If customers of Ulster Bank have incurred any charges or loss of interest as a result of this incident, they will be refunded in full. Ulster Bank will continue to update our websites regularly.

Access to Funds for HSE Payees:
HSE payees who are non-Ulster Bank customers are due to receive payment on Saturday, 23 June. To deal with the situation where these payees may require access to cash in advance of this date the arrangements below are in place:
HSE payees who are customers of Bank of Ireland may make a withdrawal of up to €500 at a Bank of Ireland branch on production of ID and a HSE payslip showing what they were due to be paid this week.

HSE payees who are customers of Allied Irish Bank may make a withdrawal of up to €500 at an AIB branch on production of ID and a HSE payslip showing what they were due to be paid this week.
HSE payees who are customers of Permanent TSB may make a withdrawal of up to €500 at a PTSB branch on production of ID and a HSE payslip showing what they were due to be paid this week.
HSE payees who are customers of National Irish Bank may make a withdrawal of up to €500 at an Ulster Bank branch on production of ID and a HSE payslip showing what they were due to be paid this week along with evidence of their NIB bank account (via cashcard/statement, cheque book etc.)

HSE payees who are Ulster Bank customers are due receive lodgements into their accounts on Monday, 25th June.
To help deal with this situation over the weekend, HSE payees who are Ulster Bank customers can make a withdrawal of up to €500 at an Ulster Bank branch on production of ID and a HSE payslip showing what they were due to be paid this week.
For amounts of €500 - €5,000 - withdrawals can be permitted at the Branch Manager's discretion.

Ulster Bank Branch arrangements
80 Ulster Bank branches will be open today until 7pm in major towns and cities to assist customers who are unable to get to their branch during working hours. 80 branches will open on Saturday for business with extended opening until 3pm.
A full list of branches open until 7pm today can be accessed here: http://www.ulsterbank.com/roi/personal/generic/service-update/branches.ashx
For a list of our 80 branches open on Saturdays can be accessed here: http://www.ulsterbank.com/roi/personal/generic/service-update/saturday-branches.ashx

2qk4u

msg11 wrote: »

Doubt it, everything is been logged. It's just not filtering down at all, basically my jist of it is there's a big error between the front end stuff (cash machines, balances) and backend stuff (accounts, funding in and out etc..). But all the data is there, but just out of sync with each other. So when there back in sync funds will go in and out as normal, charges debited etc.. On a the **** up scale I would rate it at a 10..

I'm just worried, is the balance I am seeing now the real balance or an old update, don't want to be spending money I don't have !

The balances are not updated, transactions I did last Sunday have not shown up yet, be careful...

szjon

Just remembered something else, my partner made a transfer from her account to mine and it appeared twice, then was later corrected. I think this happened another time too with a different transaction. Of course, i can't get into my transaction history to confirm it!