Chaos in Asda as card system crashes leaving shoppers across UK stuck in queues or turned away unless they have cash
Shoppers turned away from shops all over the county and have to join huge queues to use cash machines so they can pay for their groceries
LEGIONS of ASDA customers were turned away from the tills unless they were carrying cash when card payment machines were hit by a malfunction at 'every store in the country'.
Pictures posted on social media show huge queues at stores across the UK with some shoppers saying they had to wait for up to an hour and a half to pay for their groceries after getting cash out.
Angry shoppers took to Twitter to express their frustration with the supermarket giant.
Gordon Carr from Gateshead wrote: "Thanks very much @asda I have lost my 'extra' hour today waiting at Boldon store as tills stopped working! 45 minutes with no explanation."
Jim Bentley added: "@asda no backup, no redundancy system. We're just stood here like cattle waiting for your systems to start working again. On Sunday."
They have been told that if they want to buy their groceries then they must use cash only.
This evening an ASDA spokesperson told The Sun that the technical issue was caused by a server that processes its card payments and that the problem had affected EVERY store in the country.
The issue had been resolved in the majority of stores shortly before the company closed at its regular Sunday time of 4pm, and all outstanding problems are going to be fixed overnight.
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They earlier wrote on Twitter: ";We’re aware of an issue with our store’s accepting card payments & are working to fix it asap, we’re sorry for any inconvenience caused."
An ASDA spokesperson told The Sun: "We are in the process of resolving a technical issue with our card payment system in stores.
"We're continuing to process payments as quickly as we can but apologise to our customers for the inconvenience this has caused.”
Charlotte Stuart posted a picture of large queues on the social media site with the caption: "When the systems in ASDA are down so you get stuck in the shop."
Another shopper, Darren Dalby, said he was going to a competing supermarket as a result of the problem. He tweeted: "All self serve tills down. No chip and pin. Cash only on all tills. It's the 70s all over again. I'm off to Morrisons."
Sun readers also got in touch to say that they were having problems from Chatham in Kent to Trafford Park in Manchester.
Joseph Barley posted a Snapchat picture from the ASDA shop in Lower Earley saying all the tills were closed and that there was a 90 minute wait to pay by cash.
He added: "I'm shopping somwhere else today."
Kevin Osborne said he had been turned away from his local ASDA in Thurnscoe even though he had "good old fashioned cash" with him.
Queuing customer Meho Dedi posted a picture from the Trafford Park store showing people waiting in a long line to use the cash machine so they could buy their groceries.
Chris Kemp described the scenes at his local as "absolute carnage". He said: "Card machines not working, cash only and the queue for the cash machine is a mile long #boll****".
The faulty card machines are also having a religious impact as Hindus are celebrating Diwali today - the Festival of Lights.
Bhav Pindoria travelled to the supermarket today to pick up supplies only to find the pay points weren't working and that she didn't have any money on her.
She wrote: "Who carries cash anymore?"
However, to try and keep customers sweet various shops have been handing out free chocolate and goodies to shoppers caught up in the queues.
Kate Wellham said her local branch in Shipley, West Yorkshire, were giving out sweets while another Twitter user said they were getting free chocolate in Gravesend.
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