The CrowdStrike outage has caused global IT disruptions from airlines to banks, and while a pay-ahead coffee order may not be a comparable inconvenience to the stock exchange issues or upended travel plans, Starbucks has reported its systems are offline, which has impacted their customers and operational workflows across the country.
"Starbucks is among those companies experiencing impacts due to a widespread third-party systems outage, resulting in a temporary outage of our mobile order ahead and pay features," the company told ABC News in an emailed statement on Friday. "We continue to welcome and serve customers in the vast majority of our stores and drive-thrus and are doing everything we can to bring all systems online as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience."
The Seattle-based coffee company did not state how many locations total have been impacted, nor did they disclose the full scope of disrupted orders.
Following FAA alerts and other widespread technical issues for Microsoft-based computers that have ceased to work, loyal coffee customers took to social media to share the impacts with fellow Starbucks patrons.
Starbucks is closed. pic.twitter.com/bsFwSgx155
— NoneShallPass (@bfrahm73) July 19, 2024
I am now personally affected by this because I had to order my Starbucks latte verbally and stand in a line. Am I entitled to compensation? pic.twitter.com/ClVO81mIyK
— Sherrod DeGrippo 🚀 (@sherrod_im) July 19, 2024
Earlier Friday morning, customers were caught off guard after seemingly submitting pay-ahead orders and showing up to find that it had not in fact gone through at various locations.
Starbucks has a full-page alert upon opening the mobile app that states, "Mobile ordering is currently unavailable. Please visit one of our stores and place your order with a barista."
As of the time of publication, the digital ordering system is still down.
