Marks & Spencer has issued an apology to its customers after an IT glitch left shoppers unable to complete contactless payments in the UK.
The high street retailer's click-and-collect service was also impacted by the outage issue over the Easter bank holiday weekend.
Taking to social media, customers shared their frustration over being unable to use contactless payments or pick up their online collection orders.
Several consumers cited that this issue has lasted throughout the majority of the bank holiday, with the outage beginning for some from Saturday, April 19.
Marks and Spencer stores have been hit by payment outage issues
GETTYThe supermarket giant promised its customers that M&S technical teams are working to address the glitch as soon as possible.
However, M&S did not give a timeframe for when the contactless payments will be able to be processed once again.
One customer wrote on X: "Why @marksandspencer if your contactless payment isn’t working in Halifax store today.
"You wouldn’t tell your customers before they have queued in the line for 10 mins to pay?
"Poor management decision and unhappy customer leaving without purchase."
Another shared: "I’ve tried to return some clothing to the Camden store and have been told that your WiFi has been down company-wide since Saturday so I can’t return them."
"When you drive 20 minutes for breakfast at the cafe but there’s a company-wide issue, contactless isn’t working and they decide to close the cafe," a concerned customer revealed.
Responding to a customer on X this past weekend, a representative for M&S said: "I'm really sorry to hear about the poor experience you had - I completely understand your frustration.
"We've had a nationwide issue with contactless payments in store and our software engineers are working hard to resolve this as quickly as possible."
As of this morning, Marks and Spencer has confirmed that the IT glitch has been resolved.
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Many companies and banks have experienced IT outages in recent years
GETTYThis represents the second major tech-related issue Marks & Spencer has suffered in the past year.
Earlier in May, the department store chain saw both its website and app taken offline for several hours following a third-party service failure.
Outside of M&S, supermarkets, retailers and banks have also been hit with similar IT issues over the past year.
Jenny Ross, the editor of Which? Money, said: "Technical issues like these could be devastating for people who could miss important bill payments, find themselves unable to pay for essential services or risk going overdrawn - issues which could come with knock-on effects like late payment or overdraft penalties, or affect their ability to get credit or borrow money."
