Four days after its online payment website was slowed
and only intermittently available to users because of a coding
problem, PayPal.com is once again available to its
customers.
In an update on the service problems posted on its site early
this morning, PayPal, which is owned by online auction supplier
eBay, said its technicians had finally solved the problem. The
exact nature of the repair was not announced.
"We have made good progress in restoring the PayPal site
functionality," the statement said. "Most members are now able to
perform all site activities. Should you encounter any errors,
please try again."
Sara Bettencourt, a PayPal spokeswoman, said that the site's
performance had "improved significantly" after the repairs were
made, "allowing most users to transact without incident. We're
monitoring the situation closely throughout the night and will
update the community as soon as we have new information".
Many of PayPal's users had been having problems logging into and
using the site since Friday (8 October), when a monthly code update
went awry, drastically dropping the performance of the site and
causing time-out errors and other problems.
PayPal and eBay technical support personnel worked around the
clock since Friday to resolve the problems. Details about the
coding error were not disclosed.
The impact of the four-day service disruption is not known, but
many eBay.com buyers and sellers were inconvenienced because they
could not make or collect payments for items sold in online
auctions and stores.
PayPal.com has about 50 million user accounts, including about
15.5 million that are active, according to the company.
Todd R Weiss writes for Computerworld