Google fixes UK cloud outage that disrupted banks and websites
Google Cloud announced on Tuesday evening that it had restored services at its London data‑centre complex “europe‑west2” after a power‑related incident caused widespread disruption. The problem, described by the company as affecting “multiple services,” began early on Tuesday and impacted a range of UK businesses, banks and court systems.
The outage was first reported by users of popular services such as Revolut, Lloyds Bank and HSBC, prompting thousands of complaints online. In a statement, a Google Cloud spokesperson said the disruption stemmed from a “power event” in one of the smaller zones of the London region, identified as europe‑west2‑b, and confirmed that all services were now back online. The firm said it would later post a detailed analysis on its external service‑health dashboard, which provides real‑time updates on the status of its global cloud offerings.
Google’s cloud platform, along with Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure, operates regional clusters of data centres called “regions.” In updates posted to its dashboard on Tuesday morning, Google Cloud warned that several services were “experiencing elevated errors and intermittent network failures” in the europe‑west2 region. The power event triggered a cascade of issues for a variety of UK platforms, including the Royal Mail website, parcel‑delivery service DPD, e‑bike provider Forest and the video system used by the HM Courts and Tribunals Service for remote hearings.
Banking services were among the hardest hit. Customers reported difficulties ranging from being unable to access overseas funds to problems completing property transactions. Rachael Ellen, a 25‑year‑old Revolut user from Glasgow, told BBC News she could not pay for parking because her account was inaccessible. “It left me in a difficult situation as I had no way to access the money I needed at the time,” she said, adding that she could not view a relative’s transaction and received an unhelpful response from the app’s help bot. More than 1,500 Revolut‑related complaints were logged on an outage‑monitoring platform shortly after 08:00 BST.
A Revolut spokesperson confirmed that some services were affected by the Google Cloud issue but said they have now been fully restored and that customers’ money and data remained safe throughout. “We apologise for any inconvenience caused,” the representative added.
Customers of Lloyds Bank, Halifax and Bank of Scotland – all part of the Lloyds Banking Group – also experienced problems with online banking. A Lloyds spokesperson did not attribute the trouble to a specific cause but told the BBC that the root issues had been resolved and that services were expected to return to normal shortly.
Small‑business owners were not spared. Guy Baybutt, who runs the family‑owned Veg Box Company in Preston, told the BBC the outage severely disrupted his operations. The company, which supplies fresh fruit and vegetables across the UK, could not access its website to download or process orders, nor could it book parcels with DPD for collection. “We lost valuable sales during the outage, and with perishable produce we cannot afford delays,” Baybutt said, describing the financial impact as “serious” for a small enterprise without the resources of larger firms.
The incident arrives exactly one year after an AWS outage knocked more than 1,000 sites, including several UK banks, offline for hours. Experts note that the latest disruption highlights the extent to which modern businesses depend on a small number of cloud providers. “Google Cloud’s outage is a reminder of how deeply our economies depend on just a handful of cloud providers,” said Professor Feng Li, associate dean for research and innovation at Bayes Business School. He added that the precise cause of the power problem remains unclear, noting that large cloud systems are inherently complex and susceptible to failures.