But this isn't the first time something like this has happened, and simultaneous outages like this are not something that is likely to happen by chance. This report is only part of the visible problem; this is happening to other banks as well on a regular basis (see below).
If it's not chance, either external attacks have occurred against several different banking groups at once (Lloyds, TSB, Halifax and BoS are all one group, but Halifax, Nationwide, First Direct and Barclays are not), or a substantial fraction of the entire British banking industry has a single point of failure somewhere.
Whichever it is, the banks and their regulators are keeping very quiet about it.
More reporting:
https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/28/payday_from_hell_as_s...
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/lloyds-bank-down-not-work...