Coles offers customers freebies after outage closed stores temporarily

Coles has offered its customers two freebies after stores across the country temporarily shut down Friday afternoon after the supermarket’s cash registers were hit by an IT issue. To thank customers for their patience shoppers will receive triple Flybuys points on purchases made over the weekend and free home delivery for orders over $50 until October 18.

“Coles supermarkets nationally have reopened for trade after a technical issue with our point-of-sale system meant we were briefly unable to process transactions on Friday afternoon,” the supermarket said in a statement released Friday, 7News reports.

“Our supermarkets reopened on Friday evening, and the outage did not affect Coles Online, Coles Express or Coles Liquor.

“To thank customers for their patience while our team worked hard to get us back up and running, we’re offering triple Flybuys points on food and groceries and at Liquorland this weekend.

“Coles Online is also offering free home delivery on orders of $50 and above until Sunday 18 October.”

At the time of the incident, shoppers were forced to abandon their trollies full of groceries and shop elsewhere. Many shoppers also took to social media, with one Twitter user named Tracey Findlay saying she was halfway through her shop when she was told the cash registers won’t working.

She wrote: “Halfway through a shop and we are told that cash registers at all Coles stores are not working due to IT issues. They’re not sure for how long. Off to Woolies.”

Other customers shared photos and videos of confused and annoyed shoppers waiting in line for the cash registers to get back up and running on social media.

🚨 Breaking News: Coles South Melbourne is down down pic.twitter.com/XDE6xzpcMJ

— David Galea (@davidgalea24) October 9, 2020

In a statement, obtained by Starts at 60 at the time, a Coles spokesperson said Coles Express and Coles Liquor stores remained open for trade.

“Coles supermarkets are being closed temporarily due to a technical issue with processing payments in our stores,” the spokesperson said. “Our team is working hard to fix the issue and stores will reopen as soon as possible. We apologise to our customers for the inconvenience.

Starts at 60 has contacted Coles for comment.