There has been a fault in the information used to process some payments from HSBC business customers, and about 275,000 payments have been affected, HSBC said in a statement on Friday.

HSBC said the problem was caused by a flaw in information included in a file submitted to Bacs, the system British banks use to process millions of direct debits and direct credits.

This payments system failure made some companies could not pay wages to staff or to settle invoices. The fault also affected some customers of HSBC who could not transfer to clients of other banks.

HSBC has apologized for the payments system failure and promised to investigate alternative ways to ensure credits are received the day.

Some people said the bank breakdown before a bank holiday was a bit tricky. The next Monday is a bank holiday. Banks will close in that day.