Westpac is currently investigating the cause behind why customers were unable to access their online and mobile banking for six hours on Monday.
A Westpac spokesperson said the issue arose after scheduled updates were made to the Westpac Live platform.
“We are thoroughly investigating the issue,” the spokesperson told ZDNet. “This is not the level of service we aim to provide to customers and we regret the inconvenience caused.”
The spokesperson confirmed that Westpac's online and mobile banking is currently operational.
Westpac first acknowledged the issue in a tweet at 9:50 a.m. “We are working to fix the issue as soon as possible,” the bank said. It informed frustrated customers that its IT teams were working to resolve the issue.
The bank, however, assured customers that ATMs, Eftpos, in-branch services, phone banking and Bank@Post were operating normally.
This problem comes as the bank bids farewell to CIO Craig Bright, who is officially leaving the company on September 25.
In July, the bank announced it would create a new group operations office that would combine existing group operations with some innovative new ones. The division will be headed as its CEO by Scott Collary, who joins Westpac from Bank of Montreal in Canada , where he held the role of CIO for its North American operations.
COO Gary Thursby, who has resigned and is expected to leave Westpac early next year, will act as CIO until Collaroy officially takes over later in the year.
Westpac said in June that “a mix of technology and human error” and “deficient financial crime” were to blame for the company’s failure to comply with anti-money laundering obligations.
The anti-money laundering regulator has filed an application in the Federal Court of Australia alleging that Westpac engaged in “systematic non-compliance” with the Laundering /CTF Act (AML/CTF Act) in more than $23 million cases.
