WORLDPAY POWER OUTAGE DISRUPTS CARD PAYMENTS AT UK SHOPS AND PUBS

Card payments failed at British retailers and pubs on Tuesday following a power outage affecting Worldpay, a major payments processor. Customers reported being unable to use contactless or card payments at stores including Tesco branches whilst watching England's World Cup group match against Ghana. Social media videos showed lengthy queues at cash machines as shoppers sought alternative payment methods. Some pubs and entertainment venues announced they would accept cash only during the disruption.

Worldpay stated that a third-party power disruption to the UK power grid caused intermittent transaction authorisation issues and tokenisation request errors across some of its platforms. The company's technical teams worked to restore service, with some platforms coming back online during the incident. Downdetector, a monitoring website, recorded more than 1,000 reports of payment problems at Tesco from 8pm onwards. Tesco confirmed the issue affected both in-store and online payments and said the matter was resolved.

Users on social media expressed frustration at the timing of the outage, noting that busy pubs were unable to process sales from customers without cash during a major football match. Worldpay apologised for the disruption and said its technical teams remained engaged in restoring full service across all affected platforms. Tesco apologised for the inconvenience caused to customers.