Visa card holders throughout Europe are scrambling for cash Friday as widespread outages are being reported. Thousands of users are reporting their Visa debit cards are not working when trying to checkout at multiple locations. The Bank of Ireland confirmed on Twitter that many users are experiencing Visa outages. "We are aware some customers are experiencing Visa debit card issues," the bank said. "This is impacting multiple banks across Europe. We will update when we know more. Cash withdrawals can be made at any BOI ATM." We are aware some customers are experiencing Visa debit card issues. This is impacting multiple banks across Europe. We will update when we know more. Cash withdrawals can be made at any BOI ATM. — Bank of Ireland (@talktoBOI) June 1, 2018 "We are currently experiencing a service disruption which is preventing some Visa transactions in Europe from being processed," Visa said in a statement. "We are investigating the cause and working as quickly as possible to resolve the situation. We will keep you updated." Visa released a statement around noon EST but has been quiet on Twitter since. European Visa debit card users voiced their frustration online. Some wondered how they would buy groceries, access money they needed to get to work and much more. Others joked how the situation is proof that going cashless in the future is foolish. "#Visa crashing just as we went to pay for a weekly shop and its absolute chaos. If there was ever a reason to not go cashless, visa crashing nationally is it," Twitter user Rachel Crooks said. #Visa crashing just as we went to pay for a weekly shop and its absolute chaos. If there was ever a reason to not go cashless, visa crashing nationally is it. — Rachel Crooks (@rachel_crooksx) June 1, 2018 Hearing reports of a visa outage at the mo..... good old crypto doesn't have this problem — r0b1nuk 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 (@r0b1nuk1) June 1, 2018 So it's visa's fault I couldn't get my bread https://t.co/hvTjEhQh5W — Eike (@EikeSky) June 1, 2018 #Feelingsmug Statement from Mastercard: Mastercard is seeing no problems on its network.#Visa — Johnny Greenwood (@johnnyg10) June 1, 2018 Erm I need to go do my weekly food shop but apparently visa payments are broken? Fingers crossed it works for me 🤞🏻 — Stacie (@_stacielouise) June 1, 2018 There's a little glitch in the romantic tales told about a future cashless society: As soon as #Visa goes down, the economy grinds to a halt. We're seeing a little preview right now https://t.co/R4vpLacfGF — Brett Scott (@Suitpossum) June 1, 2018 This is a developing story and will be updated as more information becomes available.<doc-sep>The video will auto-play soon 8 Cancel Get our money-saving tips and top offers direct to your inbox with the Mirror Money newsletter Invalid Email Something went wrong, please try again later. Sign up Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Card payments network Visa is currently experiencing a widespread outage with millions of customers unable to use their cards across the UK and Europe. This is the network that processes transactions for a number of banks as well thousands of small and large businesses. The scale of the issue is currently unclear with Visa currently "investigating" the problem which started at around 4pm on Friday, but has ruled out a cyber-hack. A statement from Visa told The Mirror: "Visa is currently experiencing a service disruption. "This incident is preventing some Visa transactions in Europe from being processed. "We are investigating the cause and working as quickly as possible to resolve the situation. "The issue has not been caused by any unauthorised access or malicious event. We will share an updated statement as we have one." Mastercard payments are not affected and all payments are operating normally. “We are seeing nothing abnormal on our network right now,” a spokesman said. (Image: PA) (Image: REX/Shutterstock) (Image: Bloomberg) Disappointed shoppers have been unable to purchase items using chip and pin machines with many reporting failed transactions at major supermarkets including Asda, Sainsbury's and Aldi, who pay Visa to manage their card payments. Mirror Money contacted all three retailers for a comment. Asda told us it is experiencing difficulties in 'some' stores intermittently. Another customer on twitter told us "it's chaos" in Asda's Bolton branch. A Sainsbury’s spokesperson told The Mirror: "We are aware that Visa are currently experiencing problems. We are doing our best to help our customers and apologise for any inconvenience." Card payments solutions company Paymentsense said "all merchants nationwide" are affected and unable to process transactions. A Paymentsense alert on twitter said: "There is currently a disruption of service in taking payments from Visa. "It is affecting all providers across the UK and Ireland. "We are in touch with Visa to help provide a fix to this, and we'll issue and update via our social channels and email as soon we have one". 'I thought I'd run out of money' Video Loading Video Unavailable Click to play Tap to play The video will auto-play soon 8 Cancel Play now Customers across the UK and Ireland have been left unable to make card purchases - in a move that could cost businesses millions of pounds in revenue. No warning was issued to customers ahead of the outage while Visa says it is currently 'investigating' the problem, the exact cause of which remains unknown. In some cases, customers said they thought they'd run out of money after seeing their cards bounce. This was the scene at Aldi in Greenbank Road, Plymouth, this afternoon with shoppers describing queues as “mental”. Elsewhere, New Look also appears to be experiencing technical difficulties on card payments. The fashion house has declined to comment on how widespread the problem is across stores nationwide. (Image: Getty) One customer told The Mirror he found out about the outage after having his First Direct card bounce in Costco. Meanwhile Lloyds Bank said it's investigating the matter after receiving complaints about declined payments. "We’ve received some reports from customers experiencing issues using their cards this afternoon & are currently investigating," a statement read. Should I withdraw cash and are ATM machines working? (Image: Getty Images) Cash machines are working, however with an exceptionally high volume of people using them, it's advised to avoid busy city centre ATMs. That said, anyone heading out tonight is being urged to withdraw cash beforehand to avoid disappointment especially if you're looking to make a card payment. Alternatively, you can pay using a Mastercard or Amex card instead. The outage comes on the weekend after payday and just a month after a TSB crash that left thousands without access to their money following an IT migration that went wrong. Alex Neill, Which? managing director of home products and services, said: "In case this disruption is ongoing, customers should consider taking steps to protect themselves this evening. "It's worth taking cash out of ATMs - although it may be best to avoid walking round with too much. If you do have MasterCard or Amex cards, or even PayPal depending how you've set it up, then you'll be able to use these. “We'd also strongly advise people to keep any evidence of extra expenses they’ve incurred in order to try to claim them back. “Sadly, the outage could also lead to phishing emails, texts and scams, so beware of messages from people claiming to be Visa.”<doc-sep>
Visa has said that their card payments are experiencing disruptions across Britain and Europe, the BBC reports today, June 1. Visa, which handles over 150 mln transactions a day, tweeted about the service disruption, noting that they will keep updating as they resolve the situation: We are currently experiencing a service disruption which is preventing some Visa transactions in Europe from being processed. We are investigating the cause and working as quickly as possible to resolve the situation. We will keep you updated. — Visa UK (@VisaUK) June 1, 2018 In comparison, the Bitcoin’s (BTC) decentralized network has been functional 99.99 percent of the time since its inception on Jan. 3, 2009. According to the Payment Systems Regulator, the problem is isolated to solely Visa card payments. Barclays and the Bank of Ireland have told their customers to withdraw cash using ATMs. We are aware some customers are experiencing Visa debit card issues. This is impacting multiple banks across Europe. We will update when we know more. Cash withdrawals can be made at any BOI ATM. — Bank of Ireland (@talktoBOI) June 1, 2018 Other banks including NatWest and HSBC tweeted about Visa problem, noting that Mastercard transactions are not affected: We are aware that some customers are experiencing issues with Visa Card Payments. This is an industry wide issue which is being investigated as a matter of urgency and we apologise for any inconvenience. ATM and MasterCard transactions are not impacted. — NatWest (@NatWest_Help) June 1, 2018 We are aware of an industry wide issue affecting Visa payments which is under investigation. ATM and MasterCard transactions are not impacted. Visa are working hard to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. We will continue to support our impacted customers as needed. — HSBC UK (@HSBC_UK) June 1, 2018 According to the BBC, the supermarket chain Tesco has said that the Visa problem is affecting customers using contactless payment, but not those using chip and pin payment systems. Sainsbury’s has also noted it was seeing problems with Visa card payments. However, card payment solution Paymentsense tweeted that Visa has “corrected the outage” and the current interruptions are due to a “backlog of transactions:”