Retailer M&S has begun taking online sales for some items, almost two months after a cyberattack halted purchases.
In a statement on Tuesday 10 June, the retailer said some fashion products would now be made available for delivery. It added that more fashion, beauty and homeware products would be available in the coming days, with click and collect and delivery services to Northern Ireland resuming in the coming weeks.
M&S was initially hit by a cyber attack over the Easter weekend (20 April), which impacted its click and collect and contactless payments. The retailer subsequently stopped all online orders.
The company had previously warned that it would only return to full online shopping capabilities sometime in June or July during its annual results at the end of May.
Speaking at a results presentation on Wednesday 21 May, M&S CEO Stuart Machin said the group entered the new financial year with strong trading momentum, with both Food and Fashion, Home & Beauty trading ahead of budget.
“Over the last few weeks, it has been managing a highly sophisticated cyber incident. As a team, we have worked around the clock with suppliers and partners to contain the incident and stabilise operations, taking proactive measures to minimise the disruption for customers.”
“We are seeking to make the most of the opportunity to accelerate the pace of improvement of our technology transformation and have found new and innovative ways of working. We are focused on recovery, restoring our systems, operations and customer proposition over the rest of the first half, with the aim of exiting this period a much stronger business,” he said.
Machin added that since the incident, food sales have been impacted by reduced availability, although this is already improving. The group has also incurred additional waste and logistics costs due to the need to operate manual processes, impacting profit in the first quarter.
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