Several customers of UK bank Alliance & Leicester were denied access to online banking services, thanks to an IT glitch that occured while parent company Santander was migrating their account details to its systems.
The Spanish banking giant, which acquired Alliance & Leicester two years ago, only started moving the UK bank’s five million accounts accross last weekend after the deal received regulatory approval in May.
“A small number of individuals have had temporary problems regarding specific internet banking transactions,” said a Santander spokesperson. “We apologise for any inconvenience that have been caused to these customers and are working to ensure these issues are rectified.”
The representative did not confirm when full access to online banking would be resumed.
Santander, which also bought out fellow UK financial institutions Bradford & Bingley and Abbey at the height of 2008’s credit crisis, aims to complete the migration of Alliance & Leicester account holders by the end of this year.
In July, Australian-owned UK lenders Yorkshire Bank and Clydesdale Bank revealed that a failed IT systems upgrade five years ago had caused a miscalculation in its mortgage repayment rates. As a result, up to 18,000 of its customers face having to repay the resulting shortfall.
