Statement regarding incident at Erith Customer Fulfilment Centre

The fire at our Erith CFC on 16.07.21, as stated previously, was caused by the collision of three bots on the grid. The correct protocols were successfully implemented including the evacuation of the building, the activation of the sprinkler system, and the presence of the London Fire Brigade. No one was injured. The damage was limited to a small section of less than 1% of the grid, having been successfully contained by our fire attenuation measures, many of which were implemented following our thorough fire safety review in 2019.

The CFC is in good condition, and the site has been operational since 18.07.21 with colleagues delivering both Morrisons.com and Ocado.com customer orders from our Service Delivery spoke. Bots are already at work on the grid and the first orders fulfilled in the Erith CFC went out last week.

While the incident has caused some short-term disruption to operations, customer orders are being fulfilled in other parts of the Ocado network and the focus over the coming weeks is for us to restore normal service at Erith as soon as possible. We thank customers whose service was affected for their patience.

We would like to also thank the London Fire Brigade and all the other emergency services for their hard work and professionalism in dealing with this incident.

Further updates will be made as appropriate.

Last updated Monday 26th July 2021.