For the second time in three months, the technical network associated with ANZ Bank malfunctioned nationwide, causing untold thousands of EFTPOS and credit card transactions to be conducted with pen and paper.

Between 11 AM and 2 PM on Tuesday, 24 August, ANZ Bank’s EFTPOS and credit card transaction processing system was inoperative due to an issue described by a bank representative as a “technical glitch.” The ATM network and branch banks remained functional.

The ANZ representative, Stephen Ries, apologised for the inconvenience on behalf of the bank and said an investigation of the cause was underway.

The first such incident occurred in June, when the ANZ network refused to function for 1.8 million of the bank’s clients, limiting their ATM withdrawals, refusing to access their accounts in branches or online, and not processing EFTPOS transactions. That incident was blamed on an internal network error.

The day before that outage, a similar malfunction occurred at St. George Bank’s branches in Sydney, when an internal network error shut down the online banking platform and the Spider teller system. Almost all related computer operations ceased citywide, forcing tellers to find pen and paper for manual receipts.

Although Optus is the telecommunications provider for both St. George and ANZ Bank, it denies the incidents were caused by a malfunction within its system.

Source: http://www.computerworld.com.au/