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The HfP chat thread – Friday 12th November

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Comments (430)

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

  • Mel T says:
    12 Nov12 November 09:21

    Spending my day trawling through the small print on my Lloyds Platinum travel insurance vs the Nationwide flex plus to see which has better covid protection. Been getting my platinum stuff and thus my travel insurance for free for years but now they are charging so a change up might be in order. Nationwide winning at the moment, although it was not reassuring that the lady I initially spoke to didn’t have the up to date info. Not eligible for the HSBC premier account and dont have a Plat Amex don’t travel/go out frequently enough for the benefits to be worth £575). Am I missing any other good one? Staysure is on the list to look at .

  • BuildBackBetter says:
    12 Nov12 November 09:33

    Those planning a trip to Thailand now have another option. Scoot new route – SIN – BKK – LGW. Bad news, it s a low cost carrier.
    https://mainlymiles.com/2021/11/12/low-cost-to-london-scoot-launching-singapore-gatwick-flights-in-december/

  • Dr C says:
    12 Nov12 November 09:52

    Data Subject Access Requests with Creation, I have it on good authority that they are processing these requests and everyone who emails them a request will receive in the post all the data held by Creation, including all statements, transactions, terms and conditions and communication to them.

    This will obviously be useful for anyone wishing to look at making a claim/complaint against them, many people receiving 500+ pages of documents perhaps more for some. For each request it will obviously take some time of Creation staff to prepare and send these documents to each person….

    To make a request just email with your details to:
    DSARRequests @ Creation.co.uk

    • Dan says:
      12 Nov12 November 10:36

      Yes. I had 2″ of A4 through the door last week.

      • Genghis says:
        12 Nov12 November 12:42

        Same. And it’s not complete. Only looks like front page of CRM system given instead of the document level type detail. I’ve complained.

    • stevenhp1987 says:
      12 Nov12 November 10:39

      I had a massive pile of paperwork.

      Was missing quite a lot of information… It was processed after my account closure but didn’t have any information on said closure.

      I’ve questioned them on this (and raised it as a formal complaint) so we shall see what happens!

    • Andrew says:
      12 Nov12 November 10:50

      Is fun how much data comes back with a DSAR. I did one with my former employer. It arrived on a pallet and was dropped kerbside/on my drive.

      Unfortunately it was November, I was on holiday for a week, and it rained heavily for 7 days. Plus I wasn’t exactly happy to arrive back jet lagged to find I couldn’t get my car on the drive due to a soaking wet stack of 50-60,000 sheets of paper.

      So they had to do it again.

      It contained every bit of detail. Including 5 years worth of when I had tapped my card on the proximity readers in the office.

      • Jimmy says:
        12 Nov12 November 11:03

        What is the point of this – unlikely anything contentious will be in there.

        Seems rather petty

        • Lady London says:
          12 Nov12 November 11:11

          See above Jimmy (when moderator clearsy comment – keyboard ran away and uploaded half and a corrupted email address so it’s on hold

        • Andrew says:
          12 Nov12 November 11:28

          Exactly. I had all the data to hand to evidence my (genuine) honesty & integrity – as well as my location.

          My boss, on the other hand, got 10 years.

        • Rui N. says:
          12 Nov12 November 11:38

          It’s not petty asking for information that a company holds on you. If more customers asked about it then companies would stop storing so much stuff about their customers.

        • JDB says:
          12 Nov12 November 12:53

          It is, as you say, petty and a waste of time for all parties as well as trees. The DPA has significant exemptions around the provision of credit/confidential business decisions.

          • Char Char says:
            12 Nov12 November 13:16

            Seems rather not petty to request data and terms relating to an account that is in dispute over several issues, unless you of course work in Solihull….

          • JDB says:
            12 Nov12 November 13:58

            @Char Char I have, as previously stated, I have no connection whatsoever with Creation, but this is all such nonsense. If you think you are somehow punishing or getting revenge on the firm with things like DSAR requests, the firm doesn’t care/won’t notice, so all you are doing gratuitously creating work for the hapless, probably poorly paid people who work there. It will not help any complaint one jot and your account will still be closed, so putting pressure on the staff is just incredibly thoughtless and unkind towards the individual staff members.

            The law doesn’t require the firm to give reasons for account closure and the DPA allows an exemption for these types of business decisions. The irony is that in any court claim or FOS, if they have something in their favour they will use it against you.

          • Rui N. says:
            12 Nov12 November 14:21

            Just in case people are confused, a DSAR is a right enshrined in law that you can request to any company that you’ve ever dealt with. You don’t need to have a dispute with them, and asking a company to comply with the laws and regulations of HMG is not “petty”.

          • Froggee says:
            12 Nov12 November 14:26

            The issue @JDB is that Creation have managed to thoroughly pi$$ off quite a lot of people. If they had blocked Curve, restricted Revolut, and given notice to any customers whose business they no longer desired in a reasonable manner then everyone would have hopped on. Using the 1,800 accounts closed number I saw on here, pro-rata refunds would have cost them £90,000. Such refunds (in my view) would have probably absolved them of any obligation to give the free night vouchers although undoubtedly some would have still challenged this. If they’d just refunded all fees in full (£180,000) and issued points and hotel vouchers that had actually been earned then I imagine that would have been that.

            Instead we have a moderately sized financial sector business (~£50m net interest income & ~750 employees behaving like a spoilt child). I know you have read the terms and conditions inside out but Creation frequently contradict themselves and don’t pay heed to their own terms and conditions. I had my second account closed under a clause that they say will normally only be used if they “reasonably consider repayment of the outstanding balance to be at risk”. Sorry, what? I’m a customer that paid by direct debit and have never been late on any credit card payment. They are just making it up as they go along.

            So, absolutely, yes people took advantage of Creation’s incompetence and it appears it needed National Savings to point this out to them. But their response has been nuts. Tesco, Virgin, HSBC etc have all reacted to the various loopholes that Fintechs have created. None have incurred any major flack. But Creation have lost the plot.

            Who knows – maybe the Financial Ombudsmen will rule that they acted entirely reasonably but I very much doubt it. Until then, people are going to want to know why Creation have reached the decisions they have reached. DSAR is one of the avenues for this. I agree it should be unnecessary but Creation are making it necessary.

          • Rui N. says:
            12 Nov12 November 14:30

            @Froggee lots of people had the white card (myself included), so for those no fees would even need to be refunded. If they didn’t want to award more points they could have just said so, and in 90% of cases they would likely be done with it, people wouldn’t complain.

          • Froggee says:
            12 Nov12 November 15:06

            Indeed @Rui N. So the cost would actually be significantly lower.

          • Char Char says:
            12 Nov12 November 17:12

            @JDB
            It is understood that you have experience in this area, however it seems you can not understand the empathy of average people where the cancellation and subsequent loss might actually have some value or meaning to them.

            Yes a DSAR for no reason may appear petty but it certainly isn’t for the average person who doesn’t have legal experience in this area to have the relevant information regarding their account.

      • Tariq says:
        12 Nov12 November 19:14

        Sounds like they had a rather cavalier attitude to data security and privacy!

    • Lady London says:
      12 Nov12 November 11:08

      Be careful that Creation doesn’t try to send you differently written terms and conditions that are not either what you received or were given access to and told to check (and should have saved) when you first signed up, or that you had a full 60 dats notice of before they came into force.

      Based on the way Creation is behaving (although so far appears

      • Lady London says:
        12 Nov12 November 11:09

        …more likely incompetence than malice), this is really worth watching put for in which case protest immediately to them and get it on record

      • Andrew says:
        12 Nov12 November 11:33

        The most up to date T&Cs for the cards published on the Creation site are dated 12/04/2019

    • the_real_a says:
      12 Nov12 November 11:42

      Dont forget to ask for a transcript of all calls too 🙂

    • Benilyn says:
      12 Nov12 November 12:05

      Anything juicy in the docs?

    • Chrism20 says:
      12 Nov12 November 12:56

      Ah yes the creation DSAR. It took three attempts for me to get the full lot after they somehow “forgot” the first request. Second attempt got me half of what I needed. The third attempt was complete and was a 12kg parcel

      • Char Char says:
        12 Nov12 November 13:17

        What was missing that we should look out for, if you don’t mind?

        • Chrism20 says:
          12 Nov12 November 18:38

          Off the top of my head the initial agreement I signed electronically. All the details of an earlier complaint when it had taken the over a week to process the payment. About six months of statements but not all in a run, it was random months.

          The discs with the recordings of the calls also allegedly went missing although they tried to say that they sent them normal unregistered and untracked mail. I strongly suspect they had forgot about those and the lost in the post story was a yarn that bought them some time.

          • Lady London says:
            12 Nov12 November 19:21

            JDB you made an excellent point a few days ago.

            Luckily I don’t hold any of Creation’s cards currently, but for anyone getting involved with Creation or doing DSAR’s, you did mention that after receipt of anything stated as your records, it would be a good idea to get them to confirm that the records provided are complete and that they will not be relying on anything other than what they have provided to you [in this/any matter]. I forget your exact words but they were excellent.

            Two-edged sword of course – make sure what they provided included everything you yourself are relying on

  • Colin MacKinnon says:
    12 Nov12 November 10:00

    Anyone stayed at the Kimpton Shorebreak in California.

    Had a stay booked on points and it says “Ocean View King”. Looks like I can book a “Standard” room now and save 100,000 points for the week’s stay.

    Wondered if, as Spire, it was worth the downgrade?

    And do IHG demand the resort fee on rewards bookings? The “book now” page says “show prices with taxes and fees” and just gives a points total.

    When booked, it talks about 14.5% taxes and $35 a night resort fee as extras!

  • r* says:
    12 Nov12 November 10:09

    Is creation login page down?

  • Rachel Robinson says:
    12 Nov12 November 10:16

    App also not working for me.

  • Mart says:
    12 Nov12 November 10:20

    Just checking unsupervised PCR tests are ok for Maldives and Qatar airways ?

  • Blindman says:
    12 Nov12 November 10:26

    Expert Flyer-Dumb Q

    Searching for Awards flights.
    Message comes up to say “No award flights on the day….”

    However in the table column “Available Classes-Seats it shows 7

    So what gives?

    I don’t want to ring VS and hold for 2hrs to find out there are none.

    Cheers.

    • Travel Strong says:
      12 Nov12 November 10:43

      Can you not confirm with dummy bookings on the virgin app?

      • Blindman says:
        12 Nov12 November 11:00

        Sorry, should have said, it’s for an Air New Zealand flight

        • Lady London says:
          12 Nov12 November 11:13

          Not all award seats available to partners in most airlines

          • Lady London says:
            12 Nov12 November 11:14

            See if you can see them if you have NZ, or possibly SQ miies

          • Sam G says:
            12 Nov12 November 11:20

            From what I know Virgin only see a subset of even these & it’s pretty much impossible to book these partners, especially in business class

          • Blindman says:
            12 Nov12 November 11:21

            Hi
            Thanks for the reply
            I have not booked this route before but had a pre Covid trip with ANZ using Virgin miles

            AFAIK NZ miles are used instead of the cash flight.

            Don’t have SQ miles

          • Blindman says:
            12 Nov12 November 11:52

            I rang VS on their Gold line and got through in 2 minutes!

            No seats available.

            Just odd that it shows 7, but has the error message that there are no seats

            Thanks for all who answered.

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