Technical Glitch Preventing Pay, Cheque Deposits Fixed, Scotiabank Says

The Bank of Nova Scotia (Scotiabank) logo is seen outside a branch in Ottawa on Feb. 14, 2019. Chris Wattie/Reuters

Scotiabank says it has resolved a technical issue that caused some customer’s payments not to be deposited into their accounts.

Bank customers began reporting issues with getting their money early July 26, with many turning to social media to voice their concerns.

Scotiabank said in a July 26 X post shortly before 10:30 a.m. EST that it began having a “technical issue” that resulted in some clients’ inbound payments, like direct deposits and cheque deposits, to not be applied to accounts.

The issue was resolved just before 2 p.m., a spokesperson told The Epoch Times.

“We are deeply sorry for the inconvenience the earlier technical issue has had on our clients, and sincerely appreciate their patience as we worked through this,” a statement emailed to The Epoch Times said.

“We have resolved the technical issue impacting our clients’ inbound payments. Clients will start to see their payments posted to their accounts.”

Customer posts on X noted the deposit failures were occurring at a time when bills are traditionally due: month’s end. Some social media posts also asked if the bank would reimburse fees accrued because of the issue.

Scotiabank said in its email that customers would be reimbursed for all fees incurred as a result of the technical issue.

The problems appear to have started overnight and picked up in the early morning, according to Downdector, an online website that tracks online service outages.

Approximately 73 percent of customers report having problems with deposits, with 15 percent saying online banking is not working, and 12 percent saying they are having trouble with mobile banking, the site said.

Scotiabanks’ glitch comes a week after a global IT outage that disrupted banks, flights, and other services.

The outage was caused by a defect in a Windows software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.

In June 2023, TD Bank had technical problems that prevented some payments from being deposited into customer accounts. It was believed the outage mainly affected provinces west of Ontario. The issue was resolved the next day.

The bank said the outage was the result of computers failing to process a large volume of data, calling it a batch processing issue that affected multiple systems.

TD offered to refund the fees that customers were charged as a result of missing direct deposits.

Tara MacIssac and The Canadian Press contributed to this article.