HSBC Bermuda said difficulties involving the clearance of some payments through PayPal are no longer a problem.

The bank had blamed “security controls” as the reason that some recent transactions by local residents and merchants were not accepted through the online payment system.

A spokesman said at the time the problems were due to enhanced security controls the bank was required to put in place, designed to protect customers.

The disruptions, they said, were certain types of fund transfers, electronic wallets or third-party payment services. PayPal was listed as an example.

An update from the bank said: “Following the recent interruptions to some services attributed to the implementation of enhanced security controls, HSBC Bermuda confirms that the issue impacting a subset of Visa Gold and Visa Classic credit card transactions is now rectified for retail customers transacting to their personal PayPal wallets.

“Customers who hold Visa Gold and Visa Classic credit cards are now able to complete transactions that were previously experiencing declines, including certain types of fund transfers to third-party payment services (eg PayPal, electronic wallet funding).”

Tanya Bule, head of international wealth and personal banking at HSBC Bermuda, said: “We're pleased to confirm the issue has been resolved and thank our clients for their patience and understanding.

“We are glad to be able to restore this valuable payment channel to our retail customer base in Bermuda”.

HSBC said if any customer continues to experience issues, they are advised to call the customer contact centre at 299-5959 to log the issue to receive support.