Bank glitch leaves 400,000 without salaries

A major technical hitch means that up to 400,000 people will today find that their monthly pay has not gone into their bank account. Many of those affected could see their finances plunged into the red, as some will have mortgage payments and other bills going out today or over the weekend.

The problem came to light last night. But the banks have promised that no customer will be left out of pocket if the error makes them overdrawn.

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The bank payments body Apacs said: "We are aware of a problem with the processing of a number of salary payments. This will unfortunately mean that up to 400,000 customers will not receive their monthly salary as expected [on] March 30 ... The entire banking and payments industry is extremely sorry that this has happened. We are working to resolve the issue and limit the impact on individual customers."

A spokeswoman said there had been a technical problem involving the payment processing systems. Initially the systems ran slower than usual, and then it was discovered that some data may have been corrupted.