Amazon customers see error message while trying to check out

NEW YORK — Thousands of customers looking to purchase an item on Amazon early Wednesday encountered an error message on the e-commerce site’s checkout page, a rare issue for a platform that has become even more of a central shopping hub for countless households during the pandemic.

There were more than 9,000 user reports of issues with Amazon.com as of 9:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday, according to outage-tracking site DownDetector. The most commonly-reported issue by far was related to checking out on the site, per the DownDetector data.

Some customers attempting to check out on the site saw the following the error message: “An error occurred when we tried to process your request. Rest assured, we’re working to resolve the problem as soon as possible. If you were trying to make a purchase, please check Your Account to confirm that the order was placed. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

“We’re sorry that some customers may be experiencing issues while shopping,” Betsy Harden, an Amazon spokesperson, said in a statement provided to CNN Business on Wednesday morning. “We appreciate your patience as we work to resolve the issue.”

By a little past 10 a.m. ET, the number of issue reports on DownDetector had soared to more than 14,000, though the number of new reports appeared to be leveling off.