CUSTOMERS using Nets QR codes and eNets to pay merchants faced intermittent connectivity issues on Friday (Nov 3).

Based on comments on Reddit, some customers were able to pay with certain apps, while others were apparently unable to do so.

On its Facebook page, Nets acknowledged the issue at 12.19 pm on Friday, and said it was working to stabilise the service. A spokesperson later confirmed that Nets QR and eNets services had faced issues from 11.30 am, and that the services were restored by 12.42 pm.

The disruption came after the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced its SGQR+ proof of concept, which will be conducted from Nov 1 to Nov 30. SGQR+ aims to reduce the number of contracts that merchants sign to increase the number of payment schemes they can accept, such as EZ-Link, GrabPay and ShopeePay. As part of the trial, Nets will enable local and foreign payment schemes to pay its participating merchants.

Friday’s service disruption coincided with a backdrop of increased buzz over the resiliency of local digital banking.

A data centre outage on Oct 14 led to the disruption of DBS and Citibank’s digital banking services for more than half a day. Customers and merchants faced difficulties with a number of services, including credit-card transactions and making bank transfers. The disruption was the fifth for DBS in two years.

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MAS responded by imposing fresh restrictions on DBS on Nov 1. These included a six-month pause on non-essential IT changes and a ban on new business-venture acquisitions over the same period. The regulator also noted that DBS will hold senior management accountable for the lapses, and the board will enhance its governance approach to oversee the implementation of the road map.

Consumers, however, want more done.

Several Members of Parliament have raised questions for the parliamentary sitting on the coming Monday (Nov 6); these cover the cost to consumers and businesses from recent banking disruptions, the lessons that can be learned, and how MAS plans to respond.