Cases booked in the past five days can be submitted and packaged over the weekend but the systems won’t allow any new bookings.
It comes after Mortgage Introducer reported brokers complaining Woolwich’s mortgage fund booking was taking just seconds to run out every night this week.
A spokeswoman at Barclays said: “We have seen significant demand for our products following competitor movements and the challenge for us has been striking the balance between keeping competitive products on sale as well as meeting our desired levels of service.
“Therefore, over the past week we have been using the online case booking system to actively manage booking volumes, which has resulted in daily tranches selling out quicker than usual.”
She apologised for the inconvenience caused by closing the system this weekend.
Mike Fitzgerald, sales director of Essex-based Emba Group, said several of his advisers had experienced problems this week and thought Woolwich would tweak its rates up a bit in the coming week.
Meanwhile Lea Karasavvas, managing director of Prolific Mortgage Finance, expressed frustration with the lender.
He said: “Woolwich says it doesn’t dual price but I’ve spent four nights waiting up till midnight trying to book for a client who’s now gone direct because I couldn’t access the funding.
“It’s infuriating for brokers who are trying to do a good job for their clients.”
David Finlay, intermediary channel director of Barclays, said: “We try to have a balanced approach to lending and to split it evenly across all our distribution channels.
