UK payment outages cost merchants millions & stall expansion

Most large eCommerce merchants in the UK have suffered payment outages or disruptions during the past two years, resulting in losses totalling millions, according to new research from payment orchestration provider BR-DGE. The study, which surveyed 50 decision-makers at enterprise retailers, travel operators and digital service providers, found that 92% had experienced such outages, with half reporting losses between GBP £1.1 million and GBP £10 million. Four percent of respondents said outages had cost them more than GBP £10 million.

Revenue impact

Checkout disruptions were identified as a primary driver of lost revenue, with failed transactions reducing acceptance rates, increasing basket abandonment and negatively affecting customer goodwill. The less visible consequences included damage to customer trust and mounting pressure on internal business resources.

The BR-DGE research also revealed that payment system limitations have curbed commercial expansion, with 54% of enterprise respondents stating that payment disruptions or technical constraints had delayed or halted their growth into new markets.

Operational weaknesses

The study highlighted several technical and operational gaps. Only 32% of merchants have implemented automated backup or failover payment routes, while 68% still depend on manual fixes when an outage occurs. This reliance on manual intervention can lead to prolonged downtime and greater financial risk.

Providers also appear to be a source of risk, as 71% of surveyed enterprises route most of their payment volumes through a single primary provider. This concentration leaves merchants more exposed to incidents affecting that provider.

Technical integration

Technical integration was cited as the main challenge to payment resilience by 44% of those surveyed. Many enterprises reported high complexity and cost associated with upgrading or replacing payments systems, contributing to slow progress in improving resilience.

The research also flagged issues with tokenisation, a process used to secure cardholder data. While 78% of surveyed merchants use tokenisation, only 12% have adopted fully interoperable and independent token vaults, which means switching between payment providers is often complicated and costly.

Strategic focus

BR-DGE's new Payments Resilience Playbook recommends modernising payment systems across five areas: redundancy, flexibility, interoperability, optimisation, and future preparedness. The company argues that robust, adaptable payment infrastructures enable merchants not only to withstand outages, but also to retain customers and expand operations.

Thomas Gillan, CEO at BR-DGE, said:

"When payments fail, customers don't wait, they drop their baskets, switch providers and often don't return. Even short outages can mean millions in lost revenue and lasting damage to customer trust - and that's before you add other payments issues into the mix. Yet too many merchants still see resilience as a safety net rather than a growth strategy.

"Our research shows that building a flexible, interoperable payment infrastructure is essential not only to avoiding outages; to keep customers, protect revenue and open new markets."