NatWest banking app down as customers locked out

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Users of NatWest and Royal Bank of Scotland banking apps are experiencing problems this morning with customers unable to access their account and transfer money.

A message on the NatWest app reads “some kind of error has occurred” telling customers they “cannot establish a connection”.

Meanwhile, RBS has said it was aware of issues with customers sorting payments and transfers through its app.

According to website Down Detector, customers of NatWest first started reporting problems at around 2am with more than 1,000 complaining about the issues at 6.50am.

Hundreds of RBS customers have also raised complaints this morning.

It comes on the last weekday of the month when some workers get paid by their employers, and ahead of the start of the month when many pay their monthly bills.

A NatWest spokesperson told The Independent: “Some customers have experienced difficulty in making payments via the mobile app this morning. We’re working to resolve this as quickly as possible and we’re really sorry for any inconvenience caused.”

It’s not the first time this year NatWest has experienced issued with its app. Back in May, users faced a similar problem with logging in.

Among the users to share their frustration on Friday morning was Zamaan Ismail, who wrote on X: “Natwest app down, typical... what is wrong with your app??? Cant log in, send payments, had to delete and re-download and just giving this EVERYTIME.”

Another person wrote message to Natwest: “Hi. Your app keeps timing me out after like 5 seconds. Any idea why this is? Man’s got bills to pay!”

And another said: “So Natwest online banking is down... pay day today and all the bills are due, oh today Excellent.”

The full message customers were receiving this morning on their apps reads: “We’re sorry, some kind of error has occurred when trying to establish a connection between your device and ourselves.”

It goes on to ask the customer to close the app and try again, adding they could check their WiFi strength, make sure they are using the latest version of the app and visit the bank’s customer service status page.

RBS, in a message to customers on X, acknowledged customers were facing issues. The bank said: “We’re aware that there’s been some issues with customers trying to arrange payments and transfers through the app. We’ve raised this internally and is currently being investigated by our technology team. I’m afraid we don’t have an exact timeframe on this.”