Your payment provider broke checkout. Don't say so.

transcript

Checkout is down. Your payment provider caused it. Not your code. So should your status page say so? No.

A third-party provider caused this outage? Customers don't care. You chose the provider. An engineer deployed a bug? Internal detail. And it sounds like blame. We're not sure what's happening? Be honest, but not helpless. And skip the jargon.

Instead, the impact, in plain words. Some customers can't complete purchases. We're investigating. Honest, and not helpless. Next update in 15 minutes. No names, no excuses. You own it.

Then keep talking. The first external update goes out within 10 minutes of detection. For a SEV 1, an update every 15 minutes. Even with no progress. SEV 2, every 30 minutes. SEV 3, every hour.

But here's the catch. Why post when nothing has changed? Because silence causes more panic than honesty. Skip it, and customers learn about your outage from Twitter.

Customers know anyway. Be honest, timely and clear. And be accountable. You chose the provider. You own the experience.

Full breakdown in the lecture.