News in brief:
Curve and cash withdrawals
A quick update on this subject, which has been discussed at length on HFP this week.
Whilst Curve announced last weekend that they were changing the coding on transactions, which would make ATM withdrawals visible to your card issuer, it turns out that they did not actually go through with this change until Thursday. We were told it was happening last Monday.
If you made a cash withdrawal during Monday to Thursday and it was treated as a purchase – which it will have been – this does not necessarily mean that your card issuer will not pass on these new charges. You need to have a transaction done from Friday onwards before you can be sure.
I did test Creation (IHG, Marriott credit cards) and MBNA (Horizon) transactions yesterday so let’s see how these end up. You might want to wait before doing any further withdrawals.
New IHG PointBreaks lists released on Monday
IHG Rewards Club will be releasing a new PointBreaks list on Monday.
These hotels will be bookable from Monday afternoon UK time. It seems at the moment that we won’t see the list until it is officially published. I would expect to do an extra post on Monday evening if I have the time. If you are on our email list you will have to wait until Tuesday morning or pop onto the site on Monday evening.
The 100+ PointBreaks hotels on the list will be bookable for the period 1st October to, probably, 30th November. The cost will be reduced to between 5,000 and 15,000 points per night depending on hotel.
There is no teaser list this time so I can’t give you an examples of what hotels will be included. The selection last time was better than we have seen for while and included the Crowne Plaza Heathrow.
Kimpton Fitzroy London opening soon
Following its acquisition of Principal Hotels and De Vere Hotels, which we covered here, IHG has moved quickly to rebrand Principal London.
The hotel will soon be known at Kimpton Fitzroy London and will be only the 2nd Kimpton hotel in Europe after Amsterdam (reviewed here). The hotel will be named after the original architect of the hotel, Charles Fitzroy Doll.
The IHG website says that the rebrand will take place on 24th November. A press release put out by IHG this weeks says “late October”. In any event, you can’t yet book it via ihg.com.
Principal London reopened recently after a total and hugely expensive refurbishment of The Russell Square Hotel. It has generated a lot of buzz for its bar and restaurant. There is a decent chance that this will be the best IHG hotel in London. If you find the InterContinental London Park Lane to be a little tired and dated, I think you will be very happy at the Kimpton.
I will try to take a look once the switch has gone through and I’ll let you know when it is available for booking.
Other Principal hotels in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Manchester will be rebranded as Kimpton over the next 12-18 months.
(Want to earn more hotel points? Click here to see our complete list of promotions from the major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Promos’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)
About Head for Points
I withdrew £200 on my curve card at a UK ATM on Thursday and was charged £7.98 cash advance fee by Tesco Bank. So is this the end of the free cash withdrawals with curve?
With Tesco Bank, yes. However, I know that Virgin Money is not charging, HSBC is not charging and Creation is not charging.
How sure are you that Virgin Money isn’t charging? I thought they normally charge on statement?
Just going by what a reader said. Whilst the interest charge will be on the statement, the cash advance fee should be shown immediately as a line item.
Hmm I see. Guess I will give it a test later today.
Hi Rob, thanks for the info! By the way do you know if Barclays treats it as cash advance? Thanks.
Withdraw £100 and let me know on Wednesday.
As long as Creation (IHG) and Barclays (Hilton) are not charging a cash advance fee at the cashpoint then it’s happy days for me. ☺
If interest is charged at the end of month – does that mean it has to be paid off same day as transaction to avoid this?
Can we assume, if no cash transaction fees are charged for these cards that any HMRC/Amex bill payments wont be charged either?
Do you know if MBNA / Horizon card I is charging? Thanks.
Go back in time and move the withdrawal to a debit card.
I don’t think that will remove the cash advance fee.
Yes. I got done by Tesco too. Oh well I’ll try Amex payment tonight.
Curve cash withdrawal has shown up as POI FUNDING TRANSACTIONS (EXCLUDING MONEYSEND) on my Horizon MBNA statement. What does that mean?
Mine said that. Of course, Horizon doesn’t charge ATM fees anyway 🙂
You won’t know until month end whether they are charging you interest on the withdrawal and actually treating it as cash.
Is the MCC for ATM cash withdrawals determined by Curve or by each individual ATM, i.e. could the code be 6540 POI FUNDING TRANSACTIONS at one cash machine but 6011 AUTOMATIC CASH DISBURSEMENT at another down the road?
Hi Rob,
How did your test on Friday work out with Creation?
Cleared this morning and looks like a purchase – no cash advance fee attached to it.
Good news. Thanks Rob.
Creation does charge interest on some of these types of transactions though i.e. transferwise.
Let us know once you get your statement if you were charged anything in terms of interest.
Even if that is the case, creation might still be an ok option as you can just repay the next day (keeps interest charge minimal)
But if they are charging interest then it isn’t a purchase and so won’t earn points.
Actually. it is quite bizarre.
They qualify Transferwise transactions as purchase, give points, but charge an interest fee at month end (had one this month by mistake).
I am not sure that makes any sense with T&C’s though, as the charge was c. £1 (I paid it off almost straight away) I wasn’t planning on investigating further. Would be interest in learning however if you experience something similar with curve withdrawals now. (Hopefully not)
Just paid a Brighton Based company through Curve linked to my Lloyds Avios for over £3k. Here is hoping it does not go through as a cash transaction!!
And it went through? I didn’t hear or anyone get a payment through to Amex
Well did it?