If you are an introvert who also enjoys a good McSpicy every now and then, instead of ordering up front at the cashier, you would walk straight to the self-serve kiosks to place your orders instead.
But imagine heading there one day, and all the screens are black.
Family-favourite American fast-food chain McDonald’s had experienced a widespread outage on Friday, 15 March, disrupting operations across many countries, including Singapore, Australia, Japan and China.
Stores were left unable to accept orders as a result, with some chains having to resort to pen and paper instead.
Several stores had to suspend online ordering or even shut down entirely.
McDonald’s Worldwide Facing Issues with System
According to Bloomberg, issues began in Asia, leading to Taiwan suspending phone and online orders and McDonald’s Japan halting operations in numerous outlets as the situation continued to persist.
McDonald’s Japan took to X to apologise for the inconvenience and asked customers to “wait for a while until the service is restored”.
On the Chinese social media page Weibo, the hashtag “McDonald’s is down” began trending around 2PM of 15 March.
McDonald’s Hong Kong issued an apology on Facebook, attributing the disruption to a “computer system failure” and informing customers that mobile ordering and self-ordering kiosks were non-operational, advising them to place orders directly at the restaurant counter.
South Korean outlets have also temporarily suspended services, with its delivery website stating that it was undergoing “regular server maintenance for website stabilisation”.
Similar problems emerged in Germany and other European markets during the morning.
Over on our island, it was reported that the self-service kiosks at the Funan Shopping Mall and Ang Mo Kio Avenue 10 outlets were completely shut down.
At SAFRA Toa Payoh, employees resorted to taking orders the old-fashioned way on paper slips, with customers also paying in cash at the same outlet.
Additionally, users faced difficulties placing orders through the fast food chain’s app, which displayed a notice acknowledging the issue and apologising for the inconvenience.
McDonald’s Singapore also said in a statement at 6.30pm: “We are aware of a technology outage which impacted our restaurants; the issue is now being resolved.
Despite the apparent prevalence of the issue, other Asian countries like India, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam were seemingly spared.
What Actually Happened?
Maybe we thought someone attempted to hack into the system, or a clumsy employee happened to hit the wrong button, but the truth was pretty anti-climatic all things considered.
McDonald’s attributed the issues to a “global technology outage” that led to it affecting multiple markets across the world.
McDonald’s did not comment on the number of stores impacted.
A few hours after the outage, Brian Rice, the company’s Chief Information Officer, said in a statement that was sent to global employees and franchises that the outage was “quickly identified and corrected”.
He also emphasised that the outage was not due to a cybersecurity incident but a glitch with a third-party provider during a configuration change.
“Many markets are back online, and the rest are in the process of coming back online. We are closely working with those markets that are still experiencing issues,” he said.
If even mega corporations like Meta and McDonald’s can have their bad days, go ahead and have that good cry or mental breakdown every once in a while as well. It’s good for you, I promise.
Here’s a simplified summary of the South Korea martial law that even a 5-year-old would understand:
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