Tesco customers fume as IT system outage hits website and app
Tesco's website and app have been offline for a number of hours due to a major system outage.
Twelve hours ago, the grocery giant posted on Twitter: "We're experiencing an issue with our website and app and are working hard to get things back up and running. We apologise for any inconvenience."
This has continued throughout Saturday, and there is currently no timeframe for the issue to be fixed.
Tesco could only say that its IT team was working hard to get the site back up asap.
Disgruntled customers have been venting spleen on social media today.
“I need to edit my shop for tomorrow (currently all it is is a banana). I always edit the shop the day before.... can I get a full refund if your system isn't back up and running? Or do I have to pay £4.13 for one banana,” said one.
Another commented: “Site and app are still down… can’t amend my order for tomorrow… looks like I’ll be getting 7 bottles of Sauvignon Blanc.”
Well, there’s worse things in the world, we guess…
Tesco did not respond to our request for comment (about the system outage, not the seven bottles of Sauvignon Blanc and one banana, obvs).
UPDATE: Tesco’s website and app remains offline this morning (Sunday, 24th October).
Visitors are greeted with the following message: “Sorry, there’s currently an issue on our website.”
“We’re busy fixing it right now and hope this doesn’t cause you too much inconvenience. Please come back and try again later. Thank you for your patience.”
Autonomous retail
Meanwhile, on the bricks and mortar side of things, Tesco has launched its first high street checkout-free store.
As we reported in July, named GetGo, this can be found in High Holborn, on the edge of the City of London.
Kevin Tindall, Managing Director at Tesco Convenience, says: "We are constantly looking for ways to improve the shopping experience and our latest innovation offers a seamless checkout for customers on the go, helping them to save a bit more time.”
"This is currently just a one store trial, but we're looking forward to seeing how our customers respond."
Last year, High Holborn became the retailer’s first cashless store in central London.
And now Tesco has deployed its Trigo powered version of Amazon’s Just Walk Out offering there.
Tapping AI and computer vision technology, the solution enables shoppers to walk into a store, check in via a QR code, select items for purchase and, you know what’s coming next, just walk out.
