Global IT outage hits Starbucks mobile-order system and card payments at businesses

• Some retailers and fast-food chains are limiting their operations following a global IT outage.
• McDonald's Japan said some of its stores had temporarily closed.

A massive IT outage has taken its toll on some grocery stores, retailers, and fast-food giants around the world.

Starbucks' mobile-ordering system appears to be experiencing widespread issues in the US, with stores listing their order-ahead function as "not available."

One barista in Atlanta, whose identity has been verified by BI, said that mobile orders weren't operating at their store. "Definitely a weekend that I'm glad to be not working," they said.

Various Reddit users, whose identities haven't been verified by BI but who say they're Starbucks baristas, said the disruptions led to chaos at their stores and long lines of angry and impatient customers. Some said that their stores had closed over the issue.

Starbucks did not immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.

McDonald's Japan said on Friday some of its stores had temporarily closed or were only running limited operations because of a malfunction of their in-store cash registers. Bloomberg reported that about a third of outlets in Japan were closed on Friday.

A McDonald's spokesperson later told Business Insider that all its restaurants in Japan were open and operating.

The Australian grocery-store chain Woolworths told BI that some stores had been affected by the IT issue. The chain said that all but six stores were open, while some had fewer checkouts functioning.

A banner on Woolworths' website said it was "experiencing intermittent technical difficulties instore and online."

Coles, another Australian grocery-store chain, told BI it was being "affected by a global technical issue which is disrupting some of our systems in our supermarkets and liquor stores."

A spokesperson from the UK grocery-store chain Morrisons told BI that it was "experiencing some issues with payment in some stores." And a spokesperson for Waitrose, another UK grocery-store chain, told BI it had "briefly" experienced issues with contactless payments.

Various other companies reported issues with some card payments not working on Friday.

Transport for Ireland said that the top-up app for its transport passes had been down for several hours. WWF Australia said that its credit-card-donation system was down and told people to donate via PayPal instead. Trelissick, a country house in Cornwall, England, said that visitors couldn't pay by card. A cinema and café in Bristol, England, said that it could only accept cash.

Bloomberg reported that staff at the Ocean Park Marriott in Hong Kong were using pen and paper to check guests in. "We are actively working with our vendors to resolve issues that have impacted certain hotel systems," a spokesperson for Marriott International told BI.

Major airlines, banks, and supermarkets are experiencing widespread disruptions linked to an IT outage after Microsoft reported problems with its online services, linked to an issue at the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.

But not all retailers have been affected. Representatives for the UK grocery-store chains Asda, Sainsbury's, and Marks & Spencer told BI that they were operating as normal. And a spokesperson for the US-based chain Kroger said it wasn't experiencing any major issues.