Chaps Failure: Customers Urged to 'Speak to Their Own Bank' as Payments Back Up

The managing director of the payment system, which has processed one quadrillion (£1,000,000,000,000,000) pounds since 2011, has urged customers to "speak to their own bank" while it works with the Bank of England to bring the platform back online.

In a statement sent to IBTimes UK, Chaps' managing director Phil Kenworthy said: "Chaps is currently unable to process payments. This is due to the BoE temporarily pausing the RTGS settlement system to resolve a technical issue.

"Chaps is currently liaising with the Bank of England who are working hard to resolve the issue – which means payments submitted today will be processed. Chaps will be extending its operational day to enable its Participants to submit and receive Chaps payment instructions later than normal.

Almost 80% of Chaps payments (by value) are wholesale financial payments – both domestic and cross-border. Any customer who is waiting for a Chaps payment to settle today should speak to their own bank."

Britons buying or selling a house or making large payments via the Chaps system will be severely affected by the Bank of England's "technical issue" that has stopped funds being moved since 0600 BST on 20 October.

The Clearing House Automated Payment System – more commonly known as Chaps- is a UK payments scheme that processes and settles both systemically important and time-dependent payments in sterling.

Last year, over £70tn (€88tn, $113tn) was processed on the platform and, as of July 2011, the total value processed since the start of Chaps exceeded one quadrillion pounds.

People purchasing or selling a home usually use the system, via their conveyance solicitors, to transfer large amount of cash to sellers, the mortgage lenders and lawyers.