Barclays online banking borked

New improved = service unavailable

Barclays Bank customers have had to manage without online banking today after the institution unveiled its innovative "brand new look".

We've had dozens of emails from unhappy customers today and some dating back to Friday.

The bank doesn't have much luck with its technology - the ATM network went down last month and the website went down twice. Barclays suffered similar website problems in October.

The downtime could have been better timed. To support a newly-tweaked version of the site launched at the weekend Barclays sent out marketing emails to many users to advertise the glories of the new site. The email said: "Welcome to the new-look Barclays Online Banking site... It is still the same easy to use service... However, we have given the site a brand new look and we've improved the navigation... Why not log in now to see the new and improved site."

Sadly users have left scratching their heads over exactly how "new and improved" the site is, as it is still struggling to get beyond the customer login page at the time of writing.

A spokesman for Barclays said: "We had a short-term hardware problem which interupted service but we are now starting to return to normal."

A statement on its website reads: "We're currently experiencing technical problems in Online Banking that mean some of you may not be able to log in to the service. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause and suggest you try logging in again later."

The bank has been laying off IT workers as well as foisting a ten per cent pay cut on contractors. ®