Sainsbury's and Tesco restore some services after both supermarkets hit with major outages on the same day

16 March 2024, 13:31 | Updated: 16 March 2024, 17:49

Sainsbury's has restored some online services after the supermarket and competitor Tesco both suffered major outages on Saturday.

Tesco says it has had to cancel online orders due to a 'technical issue' just hours after Sainsbury's said it could not fulfil the 'majority' of delivers because of a software error.

A spokesman for Tesco said: "We are working to fix a technical issue which has meant we have had to cancel some online orders that were due for delivery today. We’re sorry for the inconvenience.”

It comes after Sainsbury's apologised earlier today following a technical issue due to "an error with an overnight software update".

A later update from the supermarket confirmed that contactless payment and online grocery shopping had been restored at Sainsbury's.

A statement posted to X by the supermarket read: "We are currently experiencing a technical issue affecting some stores, our Groceries Online service and our ability to contact customers directly.

"Unfortunately, we will not be able to fulfil the vast majority of today's Groceries Online deliveries. We are working hard to fix the issue and apologise to our customers for the inconvenience.

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"We will contact customers proactively to rebook orders as soon as we can."

The supermarket assured customers that their data is still "safe and secure even with the issues going on".

It also advised those affected to rebook their delivery from Monday onwards.

Customers have also reported being unable to make contactless payments in stores with some stores and only being able to make chip and pin or cash payments.

It comes after fast-food chain McDonald’s was hit by a major system outage on Friday which saw restaurants around the world affected.

Customers in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Canada all complained about not being able to order.

A McDonald's UK spokeswoman said: "We are aware of a technology outage which impacted our restaurants.

"The issue has now been resolved in the UK and Ireland.

"We thank customers for their patience and apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.

"The issue is not related to a cybersecurity event."