Public rush to check on cost-of-living payments cause for the disruptions
ANZ and BNZ customers were unable to log into their accounts on Monday, after a rush of people checking whether their cost-of-living payments had arrived caused temporary mobile banking outages.
Read more: Economist: 60% of cost-of-living payment already eaten by inflation
Some BNZ customers started reporting the issue to the Downdetector website around 10.30am, while reports from ANZ customers began just before noon, but now appear to have stopped.
A BNZ spokesperson said the bank had not fully resolved the problem.
“Some customers are currently experiencing issues logging into their accounts on the BNZ mobile banking app,” he told Stuff. “Internet banking is still working, so if a customer has access to a computer, they will be able to access their accounts that way. We are working hard to get this issue fixed as soon as we can, and we apologise for any inconvenience caused.”
According to ANZ, some customers had issues logging into ANZ GoMoney on Monday due to a high number of people attempting to log in at the same time, but that the issue has now been resolved.
The government started issuing cost-of-living payments yesterday, with the next instalments scheduled on Sept. 1 and Oct. 3.
Read next: More Northlanders eligible for $350 cost-of-living payment
The $350 cost-of-living payment is for workers who were earning under $70,000 a year and not getting the winter energy payment, to help them with rapidly rising living costs as inflation hit 7.3%, though Treasury said the payment would be inflationary.
About 2 million Kiwis qualify for the scheme, although bank details are being sought for 164,000 of them.
Some people living overseas even appear to have received the cost-of-living payments, despite the fund only having been intended for residents, Stuff reported.
ACT Leader David Seymour said making payments to people as far away as London who hadn’t been in New Zealand for years showed how the scheme “was rushed together at the last moment for all the wrong reasons.”
Seymour also predicted the cost-of-living payments would be extended, similar to other temporary government cost-of-living policies.
“The fuel excise tax, road user charge, and public transport discounts have all been extended,” he said. “Does anyone really believe that Labour, who couldn’t take away the punch bowl with its transport discounts, will end the cost-of-living payment right before Christmas?”
