The unprecedented surge in customers making an extra payment to watch the FIFA World Cup caused a system error for hours on Sunday, with many customers venting their ire at service providers like Esewa and Khalti for delaying their payment process.

The service providers said that more than 60,000 customers appeared at once to make a payment on Sunday. The traffic reached a record level in the evening and caused a system error, according to the operators.

The operators, however, did not give details about the financial transaction and the total number of customers who made the extra payment to watch the World Cup matches.

The FIFA World Cup inaugural match between the host country Qatar and Ecuador started on Sunday. The match, however, was broadcasted free of cost.

Nepalis have been watching the FIFA World Cup for free for years. But for the 2022 edition, the sporting extravaganza will cost Nepali fans an extra Rs565 per set-top box, including tax.

Media Hub, which has obtained exclusive broadcasting rights in Nepal, said advertisements usually cover the cost of the broadcast, but this year, they have to charge customers extra to make up for the shortfall.

Media Hub got broadcasting rights from FIFA through Viacom18 Media Private Limited, an Indian media and entertainment company by paying Rs400 million.

Following the extra investment, Media Hub decided to raise money from TV viewers.

However, on November 8, the Supreme Court ordered television channels not to charge their subscribers extra to watch the football World Cup.

On November 16, the court issued a final verdict allowing the broadcasters to impose extra charges.

“The number of customers making online payments increased more than five times than normal on Sunday evening,” said Ashish Prasai, head of business development at Esewa. “Till Monday evening, we have been observing an uptick in traffic on the site.”

The matches are broadcasted live on Himalaya TV.

Billions watch the live coverage on television, making it the most-watched sporting event in the world.

Esewa said it expects the number of customers making online payments to rise further.

“We received an unprecedented surge in customers to make an extra payment and that caused our system to slow down. But now, the issue has been resolved,” Prasai said.

Amit Agrawal, the co-founder of Khalti, said that hundreds of customers made transactions at once which created the problem.

“We received a payment confirmation after getting a response from the TV and internet service providers, which on Sunday was taking time,” Agrawal said.

The Khalti app system was also down for a few moments on Sunday, he said.