State Bank of India (SBI), the largest public sector bank in the country, reportedly had a blow to international digital activity, leaving scores of customers without access to mobile banking, internet banking, and UPI offerings.
From the initial complaint at 3.02 PM IST, there was a surge in customers voicing their concerns against the backdrop of over 800 reports lodged. As per the outage tracking website Downdetector, mobile banking was most affected (62 percent), followed by online banking (32 percent) and login failure (6 percent).
Realising the issue, SBI released a statement on X, formerly known as Twitter, laying the blame on technical issues in UPI payments. “We are facing technical issues in UPI, which may cause customers to face intermittent issues when availing UPI services. UPI services will resume at 17.00 hours IST. Customers may continue to use UPI Lite services for uninterrupted services,” the bank said.
However, earlier, the bank stated that the issues would be solved by 4.15 PM IST.
Despite the bank’s confirmation, several customers continued to report difficulties, sparking frustrations on social media. Many users flocked to X to express their concerns, with complaints and memes overrunning the site.
Though the outage was national, there were reports that Hyderabad was the least impacted. Nevertheless, considering the magnitude of the disruption. Customers in several regions could have still experienced spotty service challenges.
The incident underlines the growing dependence on digital banking and the inability of banks to ensure seamless services. SBI is yet to release details of the cause of the disruption and if other safety measures are being adopted to avoid such incidents in the future.
Customers are requested to remain informed through official SBI channels for any updates.