Marks and Spencer has confirmed that its Ocado online delivery service will launch on 1 September, but has warned there may be a delay in them being able to use the service.

In an email to customers today, the retailer said that capacity to cope with demand for delivery slots may be limited at first, as Ocado scales up to cope with demand amid the COVID-19 boom in online shopping.

The email read: “While every effort is being made to increase capacity, the extra demand may mean you won’t be able to secure a delivery slot straight away.

“As demand eases, more slots should start to become available, so more customers can start to enjoy the brilliant combination of M&S’ great quality and value food and Ocado’s market leading service.”

M&S products are available to view on Ocado’s website from today, with customers able to place orders from the start of September.

The £750 million joint venture, agreed last year, will enable customers to shop for 6,000 M&S grocery and fashion and homeware products on Ocado’s home delivery platform.

The warning comes after Ocado struggled to cope with a surge in demand for online grocery deliveries during the pandemic, with the company forced to suspend its app temporarily while website traffic jumped 1,000 per cent during the early days of lockdown.

M&S Food managing director Stuart Machin said: “The team has worked really hard to make this happen and from today, customers can view the existing range of M&S products on the Ocado website as well as hundreds of new ones.

"Our customers can be confident that they will enjoy even better choice and even better value, whether they are shopping in-store or online.”

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