RBS have apologised for inadvertently locking frustrated customers out of their online and mobile accounts.
Customers started reporting problems at around 5am on Friday with issues continuing for around five hours.
The issues also affected Royal Bank of Scotland. NatWest and Ulster Bank customers.
However, a statement issued later that morning by the bank announced that the problems had been resolved.
RBS chief executive Ross McEwan said the bank feels customers’ “pain” when problems with the system arise – but he added that such incidents were becoming less frequent.
The malfunctions are thought to have potentially stemmed from a firewall upgrade, but investigations remain ongoing.
The bank has sought to reassure customers by announcing that no client data was compromised at any point.
The latest disruption came just a day after Barclays customers were left struggling to log in. Those issues have also now been fixed.
A statement from RBS said: “We would like to apologise to customers who experienced issues logging into their online and mobile banking accounts this morning, this issue has now been resolved.”
The RBS banking group has nearly eight million customers who use mobile and online banking.
Telephone banking and ATMs were not impacted during Friday’s disruptions, however.
Earlier yesterday, McEwan told LBC: “We feel the pain for our customers every time this happens.
“We’re still working through what the issue is there...
“Absolute apologies to customers who are used to using mobile – and more and more are using mobile.”
He said: “We make a lot of changes to our technology on an ongoing basis – it may be related to that but we just don’t know at this point.”
Questioned about previous glitches, he said such incidents had “dropped dramatically”.
He said: “If you look back at 2014 we had something like 300 incidents, last year we only had 20, so we are certainly improving the organisation and how it operates for our customers.”
Customers on Twitter hit out at the bank, with one saying: “Natwest app down again. Not really acceptable for our 24 economy! How can we trust you with our money?”
The criticism follows an earlier announcement this month by RBS, who revealed plans to swing the axe on another 54 branches.
In the case of 1 of the forecast closures, the cutbacks mean that there are no other bank or building society branches in those areas.
The banking problems follow TSB’s huge IT meltdown earlier this year, after a botched IT switch saw millions of customers locked out
of accounts.
Banking customers are facing further disruption as HSBC has scheduled routine essential maintenance for tomorrow. Its mobile banking app and online banking will be unavailable for personal customers during the early hours of the morning.
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here