30/07/2025 News

 

30/07/2025 News

Hello everyone. This blog is about news that I find out that happen today, that I find myself pretty interesting, and I will report every so often on the blogs I create. I get news off Google and Bing news when I through my usual daily news check. Keep in mind that most information I may gather may not be true and that I'm just summarizing what I find online off Google and Bing.

Sainsbury's blames Visa card issues for online payment failure:

The supermarket giant has told Sky News there is no direct impact on customers and ruled out a cyber attack as it grapples to resolve an issue with online Visa card payments.

J Sainsbury, a massive supermarket chain, was racing on Wednesday racing to resolve an issue with card payments not going through, involving Visa and Barclays which was impacting customers' ability to  pay for online grocery orders.

Sainsbury's is now working with Visa and Barclays to address the issue after a number of shoppers reported that their card payments wouldn't go through and fail. A Sainsbury's spokeswoman initially said that the Visa card payments were to blame for the problems, with the retailer subsequently updating its position to say the technical issue rested with Barclays.

The grocer ruled out the possibility and said that the website and apps were functionally normally, and with no direct impact on customers. The issue never the less illustrates the extent to which the industry is on high alert for cyber security - related incidents after a spate of attacks which have raised concerns about the sector's resilience.

In recent months, major British retailers including Marks & Spencer, the Co - op and Harrods have all been victims to cyber attacks on to their companies, with the impact of M&S being particularly acute.

M&S has said that the attack on to its systems would cost it at least £ 300 million pounds and force it to suspend online orders for months. As for the Co - op, it saw in store availability of thousands of products disrupted for several weeks.

A Sainsbury's spokesperson said, " We're working with one of our payment providers to resolve a temporary issue processing some payments for our Groceries Online service. "

" We continue to deliver orders for customers and our website and app are working as normal."

Visa said; " Visa systems are operating normally. We are working with our partners to help them investigate. "

A Barclays spokesperson said; " We are aware that due to limited technical issue, some customers have had payments for online orders, where retail deliveries are due today, declined. "

"This is specific to online orders where payments are due upon delivery. Cards used in store, all other online purchases, or any orders made from today are not affected and customers can use our app, online banking and other payment methods as normal. "

" We are working with payments partners to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. Customers should not retry payments in the meantime. We are very sorry for the inconvenience this has caused. "

UK airports latest: Issue that grounded flights across UK revealed - as more than 150 flights cancelled:

Departures have resumed at UK airports after a "technical issue" with air traffic control grounded flights, with Heathrow, Gatwick, and Edinburgh all reporting disruption and delays ongoing. Follow live updates.

Summary of the whole issue in just 5 bullet points;

• A "technical issue" at an air traffic control centre forced flights to remain grounded across the country for a brief time this afternoon;
• The air traffic service, known as NATS, said its engineers quickly fixed the issue - related to radar - but not before widespread disruption hit airports;
• At least 67 departures and 55 arrivals were cancelled in the UK today, as of 7.30pm, according to Cirum Aviation;
• Passengers continue to be impacted by delays, with an aviation expert telling us long-haul flights will likely be given priority;
• Following a similar outage in August 2023, Ryan air has called for NATS's chief executive to resign over the failing.

More than 100 flights have been cancelled - Today's disruption in numbers.

Some data now to bring you from Cirum Aviation, an analytics firm. Here's a quick look at what they've found:

67 departures have been cancelled across the UK so far today;

55 arrivals have been cancelled;

Heathrow has seen the highest number of cancellations - with 24 outbound and 14 inbound.

These figures are accurate as of 7 : 30 pm, the firm said.

People comments also reflect on the dire situation on the flights cancelled, as parents report their increasingly fed up son, as they wait nearly five hours on the tarmac.

When Malc reported his experience, he said that he had been on the plane for more than four hours - and made spent it all on the runway. He's been heading to Lisbon from Heathrow. The airport's website shows a British Airways flight was meant to take off at 3 : 05 pm.

It departed at 7 : 48 pm - nearly five hours behind schedule.

" People are generally accepting and everyone is chatting to each other, but you can tell frustration is creeping in, " Malc said less than an hour before finally taking off. "

We approached BA about this, and they had to say this;

" Like all airlines, we are dealing with the impact of an Air Traffic Control issue that is affecting the vast majority of our flights. Whilst this is entirely outside of our control, we want to apologise to our customers for any inconvenience and assure them that our teams are working hard to get their journeys back on track as quickly as possible. "

For Russel, the wait apparently goes on. He's been at East Midlands Airport with his nine year old son since getting through security at around 3 pm. His flight for Antalya in Turkey was supposed to leave at 5 : 30 pm. But he's still at the airport with an increasingly " fed up " boy, he gives his opinion on the situation to sky news.

Flights returning to normal, says government

In its first comment on the disruption today, the government has said they are working with the air traffic service to understand what happened.

A spokesperson for the Department for Transport said: " While passengers should continue to check with individual airports for advice, NATS have confirmed their systems are now fully operational and flights are returning to normal. "

" We are working closely with NATS to understand the cause of the technical issue and the implications for the resilience systems in place. "

The DfT also said it doesn't have any direct control over the body and has no powers on staffing decisions.

Issue was related to radar, says NATS

There is no evidence today's disruption was down to a cyber incident, the UK's air traffic service has just said.

A spokesperson for NATS said the issue was related to radar.

Here's what they said, in full:

" This was a radar-related issue which was resolved by quickly switching to the back-up system during which time we reduced traffic to ensure safety. There is no evidence that this was cyber related. "

easyJet ' extremely disappointed ' by disruption

easyJet has had its say tonight on today's disruption.

David Morgan, the budget airline's chief operating officer, said this:

"It's extremely disappointing to see an ATC [air traffic control] failure once again causing disruption to our customers at this busy and important time of year for travel. While our priority today is supporting our customers, we will want to understand from NATS what steps they are taking to ensure issues don't continue."

NATS refers to the acronym used for the UK's air traffic service.

Sky News has approached NATS for a response to calls for its chief executive's resignation, made by Ryanair earlier today.

Earlier, they issued an apology for the inconvenience the fault has caused.

Disruption in numbers: More than 150 flights cancelled today

We've just had more data from aviation analysts at Cirum.

Their last figures - which we reported at 20.47 - showed more than 100 flights had been cancelled.

That's since risen. Here's a quick breakdown of the latest numbers:

84 outbound flights have been cancelled so far across all UK airports - amounting to 3% of all departures;

71 arrivals have been cancelled - that's 2% of all inbound flights;

Heathrow has seen the highest number of cancellations, with 29 departures and 17 arrivals called off so far.

US Federal Reserve defies calls from Donald Trump to cut interest rate:

The US president has spent months verbally attacking Jerome Powell who chairs the rate-setting Federal Reserve, calling him "stupid", a " numb skull ", and adding he should be "ashamed".

The Federal Reserve has defied calls from US President Donald Trump for a cut to the interest rate by leaving it unchanged.

The decision means it has an effective rate of 4.3%, where it has remained after the central bank, known as the Fed, reduced it three times last year.

" We're keeping the rates high, and it's hurting people from buying houses, " Donald Trump told reporters, " It's all because of the Fed. " Donald Trump has repeatedly been asked whether he would fire the Fed chair, " Jerome Powell, " if he failed to heed his demand to cut the rate.

In June, the US president, labelled Mr Powell as a " stupid person " after the Fed decided to not change the rates. Then less than two weeks later, in a further attacks, he said the Fed's chair should be " ashamed " and would " love him to resign. The US president has spent months verbally attacking Mr Powell.

There were clear tensions between the pair last Thursday as they toured the Federal Reserve in Washington DC, which is undergoing renovations. When taking questions, Donald Trump said, " I'd love him to lower the interest rates, " then laughed and slapped Powell's arm.

Donald Trump has proceeded to challenge him in front of reporters after an alleged overspend on the renovations and provided paperwork to prove his point. Mr Powell shook his head as Trump made the claim.

When Donald Trump was asked what he would do as a real estate mogul if this happened to one of his projects, he said he'd fire his project manager - seemingly in reference to Mr Powell.

Unlike the UK, the US interest rate is a range to guide lenders rather than a single percentage. The Fed has expressed concern about the impact of Donald Trump's signature economic policy of implementing new tariffs, taxes on imports to the US.

On Wednesday, the president said that he was still negotiating with India on some trades after the US had announced it's 25% tariffs on goods imported from the country that they will impose from Friday.

Donald Trump has also signed an executive order on Wednesday implementing an additional 40% tariff on Brazil, bringing the total tariff amount to a staggering 50%, excluding certain products, including oil and precious metals.

The committee which sets rates voted 9 to 2, to keep the benchmark rate steady, the two dissenters were appointees of President Trump who believe monetary policy is too tight.

In a policy statement to explain their decision, the Federal Reserve said that " uncertainty about the economic out look remains elevated, " but growth " moderated in the first half of the year, " possibly bolstering the case to lower rates at a future meeting.

Nathan Thooft, chief investment officer at Manulife Investment Management, described the rate decision as a " kind of a nothing burger " and it was " widely expected. "

Tony Welch, a chief investment officer at SignatureFD, agreed that it was " broadly as expected. " He added; " That explains why you're not seeing a lot of movement in the market right now because there's nothing that's surprising. "

Those are some news that I found interesting today throughout Bing and Google. I hope over time I should be able to adapt and learn to make these more shorter, summarized and hopefully, more informative. Thank you for reading.