A major Google Cloud outage has disrupted digital banking services, financial applications and websites across the UK, with technical problems affecting the technology giant’s London cloud infrastructure on Tuesday morning.
The disruption began shortly after 7 am BST on 20 October, with Google reporting elevated error rates and intermittent network failures across multiple services in its europe-west2 cloud region, based in London.
The outage has affected several businesses relying on Google’s cloud infrastructure, raising concerns about the wider impact of service failures on financial technology platforms and other digital services.
Revolut reported a significant service disruption, with customers experiencing problems accessing accounts and using essential banking functions.
The financial technology company said multiple services were partially unavailable, including customer registration, account sign-in, card payments, bank transfers, ATM withdrawals and cryptocurrency services.
A person familiar with the matter told Reuters that Revolut’s problems were linked to the Google Cloud disruption, according to reports.
Personal finance app Emma also confirmed that its services were unavailable because of the outage affecting Google’s London infrastructure.
The company reassured customers that the disruption was technical rather than security-related and said it was monitoring developments while awaiting restoration of services.
Other UK financial institutions, including HSBC and Lloyds Banking Group, experienced increases in user-reported problems on Downdetector, although a direct connection to Google Cloud had not been established.
The disruption has also affected businesses outside financial services, demonstrating the widespread reliance on cloud computing infrastructure.
Satirical news website NewsThump reported that its website had been unavailable since 7am, while Hertfordshire football club Hitchin Town said its online ticketing platform, operated through Kaizen Ticketing, was inaccessible.
Google confirmed that the problems were concentrated in its London cloud region, with other European locations, including Paris and Frankfurt, not reporting the same disruption.
The company suggested that affected customers could attempt to migrate workloads to alternative cloud regions or availability zones, where technically feasible.
However, such migrations may not be practical for all services, particularly those with regional infrastructure dependencies or strict data residency requirements.
Google apologised to customers affected by the incident and said its engineering teams were investigating the failures.
The outage highlights the operational risks associated with businesses depending on major cloud infrastructure providers, particularly in financial services, where service interruptions can prevent customers from accessing money or completing transactions.
For banks and financial technology companies, cloud infrastructure resilience, regional redundancy and effective disaster recovery arrangements remain critical considerations.
Attention will now turn to Google’s efforts to restore services and establish the cause of the disruption, alongside the extent of any financial or operational impact on affected businesses.
