Creation cancelling credit cards which have been used with a Curve Card

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Creation Financial Services, issuers of the IHG Rewards and (closed to new customers) Marriott Visa credit cards, made a very aggressive move on Friday in its dispute with Curve Card.

It appears that the majority of credit cards which had been used with a Curve Card are being closed.

One call centre agent said that 1,800 cardholders were impacted. We cannot confirm this number.

Creation closing IHG and Marriott credit cards used by Curve Card holders

The closure letter states that cards are being closed on 3rd December.

Based on reader discussions with the call centre, but not confirmed in writing by Creation:

annual free night vouchers on the IHG Rewards Premium credit card will still be desposited if the cardholder spends £10,000 before their card is closed

there will NOT be a pro-rata refund of the £99 annual fee on the IHG Rewards Premium credit card – although you would be free to dispute this with the Ombudsman

If you cannot trigger your free night voucher by 3rd December but would otherwise, you arguably have a case for a full refund of your IHG Rewards Premium £99 fee for the current year.

Why is Creation banning Curve Card holders?

It isn’t entirely clear what is driving this, although I was told by an independent industry consultant that it was being pushed by National Savings.

Curve Card, for those who don’t have one, is a debit card which allows you to recharge transactions to a linked credit card. You can learn more about Curve Card in this article.

This meant – most specifically – you could deposit money into National Savings and have it charged to a miles or points earning credit card as a purchase. Most Curve Card holders had a £9,000 daily limit albeit capped at £1.8 million per year.

Whilst Curve Card had always had blocks in place for payments to banks, there were certain grey areas such as National Savings, HMRC and various investment firms such as Hargreaves Lansdown.

Creation had initially sent out text message to cardholders a few weeks ago saying that its cards could no longer be used with Curve Card. I was told at that time that mass account closures would follow, and here we are.

One problem is that the ban is catching many people who used Curve Card purely for Apple Pay functionality. It was the only way to add your Creation card to Apple Pay.

For clarity …. the free IHG Rewards credit card is still open to new applicants. Creation is not pulling out of the UK and is only closing these 1,800 (TBC) accounts.

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Category

IHG Rewards

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

Anna says:

3 Oct3 October 08:26

If you ended up having to cancel an expensive but refundable hotel booking (because obviously the travel industry is still in turmoil) after December 3rd, would there be any attempt to claw back the points from IHG?
- Harrier25 says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 08:33
  
  I can’t see how they can because once they’re in your IHG account Creation can’t see how your using your points.
- BuildBackBetter says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 08:52
  
  The bigger question is the delay on the refund. Won’t be surprised if Creation say they lost record of transactions. Keep copies of all statements and transactions.
- David says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 11:42
  
  Is this for something you’ve already booked, or are you looking to game the system even more?
  - David says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 16:15
    
    Why do you have to be so unpleasant at times? It was a civil question.
Anna says:

3 Oct3 October 09:15

Out of interest I put both myself and my OH through the eligibility checker for Creation loans last night. Both deemed ineligible (we are not!), so I am wondering if Creation has tweaked its IT to weed out relevant current card customers!
- The Savage Squirrel says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 09:22
  
  Probably too solvent to be their target market.
  I got rejected when I applied for IHG card. Input a much lower income figure (hey, it’s true for the period of Covid shutdown in 2020 😀 ) and reapplied; promptly accepted.
  - WillPS says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 10:49
    
    Be careful fudging your income between applications. Very quick way to get flagged on National Hunter.
Filipino_Chino says:

3 Oct3 October 09:38

Sorry late to the party…

So if i get a Curve card, i could pay off my mortage / HMRC etc and earn points?

Just checking as I always used by Tesco account, but this is closing now…
- Nigerian Prince says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 09:45
  
  yes, but you are late
- SteveJ says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 11:26
  
  Not too late if a) willing to pay fronted / metal fees and b) willing to risk your relationship with your credit card provider who may decide to disown you like Creation seem to have.
Geoggy says:

3 Oct3 October 09:39

Got my letter.

My annual fee was paid in January so not worth the admin for a pro rata claim but I guess I’m not getting the free night I would be due in January either? I would definitely pursue that.
- Lula says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 09:56
  
  I’m also a January renewal. Reports seem to be that free nights will be deposited where they’ve been earned.
  - Geoggy says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 10:00
    
    Thank you
  - David says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 11:31
    
    Even after the closure date of cards? Do we know that with any certainty, or is that just for certs due before the December close date?
    - Lula says:
      
      3 Oct3 October 13:39
      
      I don’t think we know anything for certain. But they’d be on very shaky ground denying people the free night if they’ve met the conditions for it.
Ian M says:

3 Oct3 October 09:46

I’ve received the letter. I’ve never once done any MS spend on the card. A good time to wave goodbye to IHG all together. Terrible benefits for top tier status holders and now no UK credit card available for no good reason whatsoever.
GenX says:

3 Oct3 October 10:00

No letter as of today yet. I was using the Creation > Curve route for normal day-to-day spend. Had a few small cashpoint withdrawals a while back but that’s it. No MS as such. From reading the comments on here it seems that I should be put in the naughty corner as well. The time will tell.
- Ian M says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 10:20
  
  The lesson to learn here is that in future rinse the MS, because it appears we get put on that naughty list anyway
  - rob(staaaar) says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 11:25
    
    Lol, ‘Rinse’ – used to use that back in the day…
Will says:

3 Oct3 October 11:27

Sitting on the fence isn’t there a case here that the regulator isn’t on the ball in this market?

Surely they should be taking a keen interest in ensuring companies are correctly categorising their transactions (eg cash forwarding) as well as spend far in excess of income, paying credit cards off with credit cards and indeed the whole concept of curve presenting a credit card as a debit card?

The rules and regs around these things are pretty important because when things go wrong as we’ve learnt before it’s the taxpayer that ends up being given the bill.

Its happened with OFGEM too recently, no ring fencing of advanced credit balances and no requirement to hedge despite giving customers fixed price fixed term agreements has led to a collapse of the energy companies which will cost an absolute fortune to us all.

None of this really could not be foreseen if that’s your full time job surely.

Avro energy particularly interesting, was net asset value -27m, holding 45 million advanced payments and you can track just under £6million paid to companies owned by the directors during this time, all available accounts also ore date covid so god knows what’s happened since then.
- Chrisasaurus says:
  
  4 Oct4 October 09:50
  
  This is a really good post and surprised it hasn’t received any comment – it does certainly seem to me (as a lay person) as though this is very reactive and a case of flying by the seats of their pants in what is supposedly a highly regulated industry
Patrick Cold says:

3 Oct3 October 11:49

One factor I don`t think has been mentioned is that my IHG black card spending tracker (to £10k) is set at £0 on the Creation website when I have, in fact, spend a few grand since my last free night voucher we awarded.
- Anna says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 12:18
  
  Neither of ours have shown anything for some time, though it didn’t stop my OH’s free night certificate posting at the end of July. I have been wondering about that since Friday though!
  - Patrick Cold says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 12:31
    
    Time will tell….
- Geoggy says:
  
  3 Oct3 October 13:15
  
  So I’ve no way of knowing where I’m up to? Is it on the app anywhere
  - mark2 says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 14:54
    
    go through the statements!
  - Graham Walsh says:
    
    3 Oct3 October 15:22
    
    Yes it’s on the app. Just checked mine. Need to put nearly 7k through to get the free night. If I did it, will they issue it?