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• Rob says:

  17 Feb17 February 13:46

  No, it is cleverer than that. By claiming this is a ‘business card’ it is not bound by the 0.3% EU limit on interchange fees. That is how the business model works.

  • harry says:

    17 Feb17 February 13:56

    That presumably won’t be the case for the consumer version of Curve…(out later this year)

    • Rob says:

      17 Feb17 February 14:21

      Correct. That card will presumably have a far more restrictive feature set.

  • idrive says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:13

    so, you think anyone could apply safely?

    • Rob says:

      17 Feb17 February 14:18

      If you declare on the form you have some form of self employment (on top of your nomrmal job, of course) I doubt they will spend too much time looking into it.

  • Callum says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:25

    I’m not particularly knowledgeable on the behind-the-scenes workings of finance, but I can’t work out how that would work? Presumably for that to be relevant, Curve themselves need to be charging the interchange fee – in which case, who would they be billing?

    • Rob says:

      17 Feb17 February 14:36

      You buy £100 item in a shop – shop is charged £1.30 by Curve (a typical 1.3% uncapped business credit card interchange fee)
      Curve charges £100 to your MasterCard and is charged the 0.3% EU capped interchange fee plus a small handling fee, say 0.1%, so 40p
      Curve makes 90p

      On an Amex it would be very marginal, however. On ATM transactions they are swallowing a loss.

      This is not how it works in practice due to the various parties involved but the net result is similar.

      • Callum says:

        17 Feb17 February 14:44

        Thanks for the really quick summary. I still don’t understand it (I thought interchange fees were just the fees between banks, not the fee between a card issuer and a retailer) but I probably never will unless I delve into it in-depth – which I can’t see myself ever being bored enough to do!

        • harry says:

          17 Feb17 February 20:46

          That can’t be right, AndyR. The new capped (non business) interchange rate for MC is 0.3%.

          So Nick M makes a very good point. Why would a shop be happy to pay 1.3% when they were expecting the fee to be 0.3%?

        • RIccati says:

          20 Feb20 February 11:02

          The interchange fee is between banks (within the Mastercard or Visa or Amex) system, but it is only a part of what the card acquirer charges to the shop/retailer.

          The shop buys service from the card acquirer, which could be a bank but usually a payment processing company set up/partially owned by a bank, or even completely third-party. The total charge is from the acquirer to the merchant is the said 1.3%.

          It has been discussed here at length that the small shops will not see/not be able to negotiate their total fees down (whatever the regulated interchange cap is).

      • Nick M says:

        17 Feb17 February 14:57

        Will the business know they will be charged more than “normal” when you present the card? – There are a lot of small businesses near me and it won’t seem fair to be increasing their costs unnecessarily…

        • AndyR says:

          17 Feb17 February 20:36

          The shop is charged the same fee whether you use Curve or any other Mastercard i.e. 1.3%.

        • Rob says:

          17 Feb17 February 20:46

          Most big stores are now on ‘interchange plus’ where they pay the actual interchange fee plus a handling margin. Tesco WOULD pay more if they accepted Curve. Smaller retailers don’t have the power to negotiate ‘interchange plus’.

• idrive says:

  17 Feb17 February 14:12

  well, if it is obviously for self employed, I am sure they will block or limit the accounts. Or request documentation or check themselves..
  It seems too risky to apply now if employed..

  • harry says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:19

    You can be both employed & self-employed at the same time

• Sussex Bantam says:

  17 Feb17 February 14:16

  Hi – if anyone needs a referral code mine is 8uWFz. If I get any credits from this I will donate 100% of the credit to Marie Curie Cancer Care. Thanks for using it if you do !

  • sd83 says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:26

    that is a brilliant idea and a fantastic cause!

  • Alan says:

    17 Feb17 February 15:51

    Good cause, have used your code!

• darrenf says:

  17 Feb17 February 14:32

  so Curve is for business expenses only, but allows you to tie to M&S Bank, who don’t offer business accounts?

  • Genghis says:

    17 Feb17 February 15:50

    One can be self-employed and use a personal account for ‘business’ purposes. After all, the person and the ‘business’ are inseparable.

• harry says:

  17 Feb17 February 14:41

  They state that a typical user will save some £60 a year. They probably know what they’re talking about.

  So when people stick though £10K of HMRC bill, or withdraw £10K of cash over several months, this will cost somebody an extra £100-£200. (Based on 1p/ MR point, with MR points being earned @ 1-2 MR points/ £1.)

  And if 10K were allowed (fair usage etc) – then what about £25K?

  Do you honestly think you’ll end up with a card capable of doing this? I don’t think either Amex or Curve are likely to want to fund it, so it simply won’t happen. Look how easily 3V stopped financial transactions.

  That might be an argument to get in first & thrash the ass off of it while you can – I’m sympathetic to that concept 🙂 – but something tells me it won’t be half as lucrative as people hope. Whereas it looks as if the parameters for foreign spend are quite sustainable, ie bearable in the long term.

  • Rob says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:46

    If HMRC take it, it will be as a credit card and not a debit card. That is profitable for them.

    (Remember, this is not a debit card. It is a prepaid MasterCard.)

    ATM usage is a separate issue but that is already covered in their rules. They would probably cut you off before you’d cost them much more than the £35 fee.

    • mark2 says:

      17 Feb17 February 15:29

      So what exactly is a ‘prepaid MasterCard’ please?
      This usually means a card to replace travellers’ cheques. Does it mean that they debit your other card account before paying the merchant? This would explain why people have been debited on their other card when the transaction failed.
      A crucial question to me is ‘do I have to give this start up the PINs for all of my cards?’
      If so, how good is their security?

      • Callum says:

        17 Feb17 February 15:38

        It’s a Mastercard that you prepay. It doesn’t remotely mean a “card to replace travellers cheques”.

        No you don’t have to give them your PINs.

        • mark2 says:

          17 Feb17 February 15:43

          So you have to pay them before you can use the card?

        • Callum says:

          17 Feb17 February 15:51

          Technically, but not the way you’re thinking (and I can see how what I said was misleading in this context so sorry!).

          Technically you’ll be paying them and THEN they are paying your card provider, but in reality you’ll be using it just like a normal card. It’s apparently registered as a pre-paid card in the Mastercard system however, so merchants won’t necessarily accept it as a Debit card.

        • Rob says:

          17 Feb17 February 20:15

          …. which is why Amex reject it.

        • harry says:

          17 Feb17 February 15:54

          No – if I understood that bit, Curve people simply take payment from the card you have associated (with Curve card) at the exact same time.

          ie 1. pay with Curve card @ 10am
          2. Curve people take payment from your (say) Amex card @ 10am
          3. you pay your Amex card bill @ the end of the month.

          So Curve is functioning ‘just like’ a prepaid MasterCard (ie a MC loaded with credit) but it’s not ‘actually’ a prepaid MC, it’s a card with a MC logo – and which is the interface between the outlet where you are making a purchase and your (say) Amex back home in the sock drawer.

  • Jonathan says:

    17 Feb17 February 14:50

    Did you sign up to it in the end? Agree with you and am still sitting on the fence on this one (would go for it if I was self-employed).

    • Simmo says:

      17 Feb17 February 16:07

      Isn’t it a once off fee?

• OverTheHorizon says:

  17 Feb17 February 15:19

  Amusingly enough, when I use Chrome to look at their website (imaginecurve.com) I get a security error because “the site loaded an insecure script.”

  Not a terribly auspicious start !

• harry says:

  17 Feb17 February 15:40

  er…that’s how 3V started out 🙂

  I go back to my earlier point: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Admittedly, 3Vs were great while they lasted.

  So you put through £10K of tax bill, earning 10-20,000 MR points. Just who is actually going to pay for your points…?

  • James says:

    17 Feb17 February 16:02

    The person paying the tax, Harry. Rob has stated (twice) that this isn’t a pre paid debit card, it’s a pre paid credit card, therefore if there are any fees to be paid, they will be paid by the tax payer, so you are paying for your points.

    • harry says:

      17 Feb17 February 16:22

      I don’t think that’s been demonstrated (@HMRC) yet. (3Vs went through as debit cards ISTR.)

      Raffles doesn’t know if HMRC will accept Curve – though I imagine it won’t be long before we find out. He already said Curve people refused to let him pay his credit card bill with Curve card. HMRC could easily be the same, if not immediately then soon after.

      If it goes as you assume, ie Curve card is treated as a MC credit card by HMRC, ie 1% fee payable by the cardholder, then you are back to the same problem of multiple credit card transactions likely to be refused by HMRC (their new published policy).

      You’d have to count on just 1 transaction going through for sure, up to Curve card limit (another unknown), and you paying the 1%. Isn’t 1% similar to earning 1 MR point per £1? Ie no particular value as regards earning points, just good to hit spend target.

      My assumption is that your Curve card limit will be rather lower than your Amex card limit.

      So a likely scenario might be:
      – people able to pay a few £thousand to HMRC on the Curve card in 1 transaction
      – repeat transactions are limited/ refused
      – you don’t earn net rewards on this as HMRC fee counters the MR points (better if you have a 2 point Amex card like me 🙂 )
      – but you do get faster to your spend target on your Amex card

      • James says:

        17 Feb17 February 16:55

        Yes agreed nobody knows whether HMRC will accept Curve, as I said above it’s a case of wait and see but I will be surprised if they don’t. Ostensibly this is a prepaid MasterCard, which AFAIK HMRC accept. So I don’t think acceptance will be an issue. personally. They won’t lose money, they get their tax money, end of.

        And yes, the whole point of this for me would be to accelerate a sign up bonus.

  • rams1981 says:

    17 Feb17 February 16:52

    who knows? but if it’s at least £75 worth of points before it expires, it will be money well spent. If not, live and learn…
    Being able to use AMEX at non-AMEX places is a great perk though.

    • harry says:

      17 Feb17 February 17:03

      Non-Amex places such as? Bearing in mind personal spend is not allowed.

      You might scoff at this & tell me Curve will just turn a blind eye.

      Somehow I doubt this. They are aiming this first card at business users and if I got this bit right, Raffles explains that ‘business use only’ limitation as being an essential part of their strategy. Ie ‘business use only’ means Curve can get around the interchange rules and charge more commission. That’s the main way they will make a profit, so they are sure to protect it.

      • rams1981 says:

        17 Feb17 February 17:33

        how is withdrawing cash other than big amounts a “business use”. That’s a pretty big perk which they keep highlgihting. Don’t be so suspicious 🙂

        • harry says:

          17 Feb17 February 17:41

          I’m afraid I am a bit cynical. Eg Raffles guessed earlier that if you got Amex points valued @ £35 through withdrawals, Curve would stop you withdrawing money in future or block your card. On my 2 point/ £1 card, that’s only £1750 in withdrawals.

          You’re right that they do indeed highlight points on cash withdrawals as a Curve benefit. But if the fair usage limit is pretty low, it’s a pretty small benefit.

      • Will says:

        17 Feb17 February 17:55

        Harry, like you I’m on the fence. Am waiting to see what Raffles article says before I make my decision. I understand that when signing up you declare that you’re self employed or a director to use this product. My question is how would curve determine/ class purchases as personal or business? (as hmrc have different rules as to whom can claim certain spend as business where others can not). With the sector i work in as self-employed, i can buy things in lidl ( as someone mentioned does not take Amex) or a Rolex every year and claim as business. I wonder,as declared that you are a business the onus is on the account holder to determine this??

        • Rob says:

          17 Feb17 February 20:10

          Let’s be clear. Curve doesn’t care. They just pretend to care so that MasterCard doesn’t yank their licence to issues ‘business’ cards.

          If they were really concerned they wouldn’t be promoting it to ‘entrepreneurs, freelancers’ etc which covers pretty much anyone who makes a £1 from anything outside of a salaried job.

      • fred says:

        17 Feb17 February 18:35

        Screwfix, for example.

• Alan says:

  17 Feb17 February 15:52

  Well have taken a total punt – went for the black card even though I’ve got an Android device, hopefully they’ll release the app soon and in the meantime should be able to make use of an old iPod Touch!

  • harry says:

    17 Feb17 February 15:58

    You just got yourself a very nice bulletproof wallet for £40 🙂

    • Alan says:

      17 Feb17 February 16:00

      Hahaha and a donation to Marie Curie for £10 courtesy of Curve via Sussex Bantam 😀

      Have got a few sign-up targets to hit and the domestic ATM withdrawal side has a definite appeal so am up for giving it a go!

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