Guidance

Rural Payments service: check for maintenance and downtime

Check for maintenance and downtime of the Rural Payments service over the next 4 weeks

Applies to England

There will be times when the Rural Payments service is unavailable because of essential planned maintenance and updates.

The Rural Payments Agency (RPA) will aim to minimise disruption to the service by scheduling planned maintenance times. We will try to give as much notice as possible about maintenance and downtime of the service, though we may not always be able to do this.

What maintenance and downtime is scheduled

Maintenance and downtime scheduled for the next 4 weeks. Some dates and times may change during the 4-week period.

From To Reason for downtime
5:156:00 pm TuesdayWednesday
1815 NovemberOctober
9:00 pm Wednesday
15 October
General maintenance
6:00 pm Wednesday
22 October
9:00 pm Wednesday
22 October
General maintenance
2:00 am Friday
24 October
4:00 am Friday
24 October
System maintenance
6:00 pm Wednesday
1929 NovemberOctober
9:00 pm Wednesday
29 October
MajorGeneral maintenance
6:00 pm Wednesday
1905 November
9:00 pm Wednesday
1905 November
General maintenance
5:15 pm Tuesday
18 November
9:00 am Wednesday
19 November
Major maintenance
6:00 pm Wednesday
2619 November
9:00 pm Wednesday
2619 November
General maintenance
6:00 pm WednesdayFriday
1005 December
9:00 pm WednesdayFriday
1005 December
General maintenance
6:005:15 pm ThursdayWednesday
1110 December
9:00 am FridayThursday
1211 December
Major maintenance
6:00 pm Wednesday
17 December
9:00 pm Wednesday
17 December
General maintenance

Types of maintenance

There are different types of maintenance that need to be carried out.

Type of maintenance Maintenance details
Major Planned downtime to release new functionality and software upgrades
General Weekly planned downtime to update land and customer details
System To fix system functionality

Updates to this page

Published 10 October 2023
Last updated 1315 NovemberOctober 2025 + show all updates
  1. Added new dates for downtimes, and removed previous passed downtimes

  2. Added General, System, and Major updates from the 24th of October too the 17th of December.

  3. Removed past downtime notifications.

  4. Added downtimes from the 8th of October to the 5th of November.

  5. Removed completed downtimes and added downtime starting the 1st of October.

  6. Added downtime for Friday the 19th of September.

  7. Updated general maintenance too the 17th of September.

  8. Removed old system downtime notifications that have been completed.

  9. The downtime for Wednesday the 03rd of September has been cancelled and removed from this page.

  10. Updated dates and times of downtimes to the 3rd of September and the 10th of September.

  11. Removed the downtime that was scheduled for the 27th of August.

  12. Changed the downtime starting 1st of September to the 2nd of September

  13. Removed down time from 21st of August Added down times 20th of August to the 10th of September.

  14. Downtime added from 4pm to 4.45pm on Friday 1 August.

  15. Removed downtimes that have been completed, added downtime over Friday the 05th of September to Sunday the 07th of September.

  16. Added downtimes notes for the 23rd of July and the 21st of August.

  17. Updated the downtime to the 16th of July

  18. Removed all completed downtimes, added downtime for 09th of July.

  19. Updated downtime started the 25th, no starts 5:15 of the 25th, and ends 9am 26th.

  20. Added downtime for 24th of June.

  21. Removed previous 2 downtimes.

  22. Removed downtime for 18th of June.

  23. Added 4 downtime notices from the 11th of June to the 2nd of July.

  24. Downtime from 19th - 20th of May moved to the 27th - 28th of May

  25. Removed down time date for the 14th.

  26. Removed, rescheduled and added new downtimes.

  27. Removed past downtime from Thursday24th April

  28. Downtime notification added for 24 April 2025 between 6pm and 10pm.

  29. Added down time from 09/04 - 21/05. Removed downtime before 04/04.

  30. Added and removed various dates and times of the downtimes

  31. Removed 2 entries from the 12th of march.

  32. The downtime for the 11th and 12th of March has been added.

  33. Added entry for Thursday 19th March

  34. Downtime notifications added to page for March and April 2025

  35. Updates to Major downtime notifications for December.

  36. Updated planned downtime for the remainder of October 2024

  37. Further updates to October 2024 Downtime notifications added to page

  38. Essential maintenance downtime added for Friday 20 September between 6pm and 8pm

  39. Updated downtime scheduled.

  40. Scheduled downtime added for Wednesday 7 August 2024

  41. Scheduled maintenance added for 22 July.

  42. Updates to planned downtime for July and August 2024.

  43. Updates to June downtime!

  44. Added downtime notification for 13 May

  45. Updates to planned downtime to include additional downtime for 24 April

  46. Updates to Rural Payments downtimes scheduled for May 2024

  47. Updated Rural Payments downtime for May 2024.

  48. Updates to Rural Payments downtime for March/April 2024

  49. Updates to downtime times for the March and April 2024

  50. Updated planned downtime for March

  51. Further updates made to February/March 2024 scheduled downtimes

  52. Downtime scheduled for today 21/02 has been updated

  53. Updated scheduled Rural Payments downtime notifications for February 2024.

  54. Updates to RP downtime scheduled for Friday 19 January

  55. Updates to planned Rural Payments downtime for January 2024

  56. Updates to Friday 12th January 2024 for planned downtime.

  57. Downtime added for week commencing 1 January 2024

  58. Updated downtime for week commencing 18 December.

  59. Update to planned downtime during December 2023

  60. Planned downtime entered for Wednesday 29th November from 6pm to 9pm

  61. Updates to planned downtimes during November and December 2023.

  62. The Rural Payments Service is back online

  63. Rural Payments service unavailable due to unplanned system maintenance.

  64. Updates to planned downtime for essential maintenance to Rural Payments for November.

  65. Change of downtime.

  66. Updated to scheduled Maintenance

  67. First published.

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