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Curve Card is now working with American Express for beta testers – this is how it works

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(EDIT:  Curve has changed a lot since this article was published.  Please do not rely on the information here.  Instead, please click here to read our detailed 2020 Curve review, which includes a link for a free £10 credit when you sign up.)

Curve Card is an all-in-one payment wallet and aggregator that is popular amongst Head for Points readers.  I describe Curve in detail here, but in summary:

Curve Card (a debit Mastercard) is free – in fact Curve will pay you £10 for trying it out if you use our link

You can link any other Visa or Mastercard to Curve – so the smart thing to do is to link a miles or points earning card

You can pay DEBIT card bills with Curve which are recharged to your linked Visa or Mastercard.  Importantly, this recharge goes through as a purchase and so earns miles and points on the underlying card.

You can withdraw £200 of cash per month at an ATM for free and it will be recharged to your underlying Visa or Mastercard as a purchase, earning miles and points (unless you have a credit card from Tesco Bank, which treats Curve ATM transactions as cash)

You pay ZERO FX fees when using your Curve Card for overseas spending (Mon-Fri, a 0.5% loading applies at weekends).  This effectively turns ANY Visa or Mastercard into a ‘no FX fees’ credit card.  There is a £500 per month ‘no FX fees’ limit on the free Curve Blue card and a £15,000 annual limit on the £50 Curve Black card.

As you can see, there is lots of interesting stuff here that can both save you money on FX fees and earn you miles and points too.

Curve is about to allow American Express cards to be linked to the card.  This will have a number of advantages:

You can pay with American Express anywhere, even at shops which don’t allow American Express, by using your Curve Mastercard linked to your Amex

You can pay with American Express at places which only accept debit cards, by using your Curve Mastercard linked to your Amex

You can spend abroad on American Express without incurring FX fees, by using your Curve Mastercard linked to your Amex (up to £500 per month on the free Curve version)

Amex payments are currently operating via a Beta programme with a small number of Curve users.

In summary:

Amex functionality is a little different.  You will have an e-wallet enabled in your Curve app.  You need to pre-load this with funds from your linked American Express card.  The T&Cs say that eventually the top-up will be automated, so that you don’t need to manually load funds – as soon as you make a £100 Curve purchase, for example, Curve will automatically top-up your e-wallet and authorise the transaction.  

Amex use is not free.  Holders of the free Blue Curve card will pay 0.65% on all American Express transactions.  Holders of the £50 Black Curve will get £1,000 of American Express payments for free each month, with a fee of 0.65% thereafter.

All UK personal American Express cards are accepted as far as I can tell.  This includes charge (Platinum), BA, SPG etc.  This is a surprise as I understood that only the co-brand cards – which have had their fees capped under EU legislation – were going to participate.

Is it worth paying 0.65% for American Express acceptance?

Oddly, there is not a straight answer here.

If you have Curve Black then, whilst you are spending your £1,000 of free Amex allowance per month, it is clearly a good deal.  Beyond that, or for all Curve Blue customers, it is a bit different.

On the face of it, you might say:

“I am paying 0.65p per £1 recharged to my free BA Amex to earn 1 Avios, and 0.65p is a bargain”, or

“I am paying 0.65p per £1 recharged to my BA Premium Plus Amex to earn 1.5 Avios, and 0.43p per Avios is a great bargain”, or

“I am paying 0.65p per £1 recharged to my SPG Amex to earn 3 Starwood / Marriott points, and 0.22p per Starwood / Marriott points is a great bargain”

However ….

There is also an opportunity cost because you could have used a Visa or Mastercard for free.  You could for example:

Link a Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard to Curve, earn 1.5 Virgin miles per £1 and pay no transaction fee, or

Link a BA Premium Plus American Express to Curve, earn 1.5 Avios per £1 and pay 0.65% transaction fee

Your American Express acceptance cost is therefore 0.65% PLUS whatever rewards you would have got for free linking your highest earning Visa or Mastercard instead.

There are very few ‘super generous’ Visa or Mastercard products available however, so unless you have one of the new Virgin Atlantic cards or the IHG Rewards Club Premium Mastercard then paying for Amex acceptance via Curve is likely to be your best bet.

Of course, if ‘manufacturing’ American Express spend via Curve Card makes it easier to hit the 2-4-1 voucher on your British Airways American Express card, or hit the sign-up bonus on a new Amex, or hit the 10000 points annual bonus for spending £15000 on American Express Preferred Rewards Gold, then the maths changes again.

Most Head for Points readers WILL get a lot of benefit from linking their American Express card to Curve.

When can I get it?

I don’t know.  The Beta programme launched last week for those who were invited.  The rest of us will have to wait a while.

It is also worth noting that Curve is planning to replace the existing Black card with two new products, each of which will carry a monthly fee but will come with a far wider range of benefits than you receive now.  I am not sure how existing Black cardholders will be migrated.

There is certainly no harm in getting yourself the free Curve Blue card now.  You can enjoy all of the benefits I outlined at the top of the page whilst waiting for Amex acceptance to roll out. Curve will pay you £10 for trying it out if you use our link.

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Comments (269)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Colin says:
    26 Nov26 November 07:35

    I’ve been using the Curve American Express beta since Thursday morning when I was onboarded. Happy to answer any questions anyone may have? It’s been a very smooth process so far with topping up and it’s working fine with both my BAPP Amex and my Platinum Card.

    I’m currently working in Australia and have been paying for things quite happily using my Curve card.

  • hamiltus says:
    26 Nov26 November 07:40

    Really annoyed that non UK AMEX cards aren’t supported when they implied at the beginning that everyone would be able to add AMEX to their cards… Curve should have told us all from the beginning that only UK AMEX cards would be supported.

    They really need to work on their customer transparency…. If they’re still, as they say, “currently in negotiations with Amex about making the feature available for the rest of the EEA”, then why didn’t they just tell everyone, when they first announced the return of Amex, that it would be initially UK only then we’d all have understood and would have waited our turn to sign up in the EU. Instead we all signed up in earnest cos they remained coy and built up hype around AMEX… And now we find out that we’re being shunned into a corner?

    Very disappointing with their customer service lately and not filling me with confidence… Especially with the badly coy generic template twitter responses they’ve been putting out lately…

    • Geoff says:
      26 Nov26 November 07:49

      This is just the beta version though.

      • hamiltus says:
        26 Nov26 November 09:12

        But they didn’t say at first that there would be a beta phase. If you have a look at their messages to customers on Twitter they made it out that we’d all be able to add AMEX cards in November whilst being way too coy. But then they suddenly backtrack those statements which are still visible if you dig around on their twitter replies.

        My main point was, they shouldn’t tell customers one thing then go and say “oops we meant this instead and most of you that bought into our product for this feature are out of luck even thought we hyped it up”.

  • Bazza says:
    26 Nov26 November 07:54

    Which credit cards can I pay off with this? IHG? If I with draw 10 grand cash against IHG do I get the IHG status that goes with the spend?

    What ISA can I fund with it?

    Any other secrets?

    • MDA says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:00

      You are aware there is a fee with any cc withdrawals above £200 per month. So you’re looking at £7,600 worth in fees

    • roberto says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:01

      secret

      /ˈsiːkrɪt/Submit
      adjective
      .
      not known or seen or not meant to be known or seen by others.
      “how did you guess I’d got a secret plan?”
      synonyms: confidential, strictly confidential, top secret, classified, restricted, unrevealed, undisclosed, unpublished, untold, unknown, uncommunicated, behind someone’s back, under wraps, unofficial, off the record, not for publication/circulation, not to be made public, not to be disclose

  • MDA says:
    26 Nov26 November 07:58

    Curve DOESNT work at a tesco petrol filling station so if you’re planning a road trip (short or far) you’re STUFFED 😕

    • Jonathan says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:13

      It works, just not at the pay at pumps. Kiosks only.

    • Shoestring says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:15

      Anybody thinking packing Curve as your only credit card in your ultra slim wallet is somehow a great convenience must be barking. As always, you need a raft of physical credit/ debit cards as backup.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        26 Nov26 November 08:17

        Not really.

        I have my curve. My Amex and my phone. Never had a problem not paying with either of those 3 in the uk

        Would add my horizon abroad.

      • Simon says:
        26 Nov26 November 08:23

        @Shoestring +1 But the Curve PR team, which is out in force this morning, will disagree.

      • Graham Walsh says:
        26 Nov26 November 09:21

        I have my Curve, Amex Plat, Lloyds Amex and Driving License in my wallet and in SA this week. Apple Pay as backup.

        • Genghis says:
          26 Nov26 November 09:24

          Ambitious. I take a myriad of cards when abroad in addition to my UK ones. I have required use of them

        • Graham Walsh says:
          26 Nov26 November 09:27

          Oh and no cash. Signs everywhere at the hotel I’m at (Autograph) say NO CASH

    • TGLoyalty says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:16

      Afaik no pre paid cards will work in filling station pay at pump due to the way they are set up.

      As a purchase in a kiosk or store they will be fine. Also some places which do offline contactless transactions may not accept it.

    • Alan says:
      26 Nov26 November 13:21

      Including pay inside or just pay at pump?

  • Mary Berry says:
    26 Nov26 November 07:59

    Why would you do that and expect to be able to link your Amex? The article clearly says Amex use is via invite only during beta test; and if not existing customer with invite then you’ll have to wait for public roll out.

  • Simon says:
    26 Nov26 November 08:13

    “I am not sure how existing Black cardholders will be migrated.” And that’s why, Rob, yoi should have held off advising HFP readers to upgrade!

    • Alex W says:
      26 Nov26 November 09:41

      Why? If not happy you can just downgrade again. They can’t surely force you to pay a fee if you don’t agree.

  • Alex says:
    26 Nov26 November 08:14

    Natwest also treats curve withdrawals as cash, for quite some time now.

  • Adil says:
    26 Nov26 November 08:23

    Will Amex offers still be triggered even when using the card through curve?

    • Simon says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:25

      Club Lloyds offers don’t trigger with Curve, so I’d say no. Be interesting to hear from the PR team/beta testers on this.

      • Michal says:
        26 Nov26 November 11:48

        I am beta tester. I could add only 1 AMEX card and choosed SPG. So can’t test Lloyd’s at the moment.
        Top up to Curve shows on Amex statement as CURVE AMEX WDB London. Maybe this is going to change after beta. Amex doesn’t have any idea about spending at the moment. Great staff is you get full reward points as top up is always rounded.
        I payed part of HMRC tax bill completely for free and also bought some discounted gift cards from perk box where only Visa/MasterCard are accepted. Already hit £1000pm for free.
        It looks like I could pay some part of my Amex bill and do ‘manufacturing’ but I am never going to try it. Curve has updated fair using policy and I believe they could reverse transaction to any other debit card or ban my account. Any questions about beta testing feel free to ask.

        • Tom says:
          26 Nov26 November 14:19

          Is the curve transaction 100% being treated as a points earning purchase and not a cash advance (or a top up of a financial product)? I’d hope so, as to treat it as cash would kill the benefits stone dead.

        • Michal says:
          26 Nov26 November 16:26

          Yes. I received all points and wasn’t charged anything extra from Amex for my first £100 top up in my last statement. Second £900 top up is still pending as it was done yesterday. But it is going to be the same = points earning purchase!

        • Genghis says:
          26 Nov26 November 19:35

          The Merchant Category Code used is 8999 – “Professional Services (Not Elsewhere Defined)”, ie not cash.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      26 Nov26 November 08:35

      Nope as the transaction isn’t directly from the retailer to Amex it’s via curve. Just like PayPal doesn’t work.

      Tbh if they offer Amex offers they should accept the card anyway?

      • Brian says:
        26 Nov26 November 09:24

        You do get the odd Nero, for example, franchise that doesn’t accept AMEX.

        • Alex W says:
          26 Nov26 November 09:43

          Burger King and Subway are frequently on Lloyd’s offers but don’t accept Amex (even though they are American!!).

        • john says:
          26 Nov26 November 15:48

          The ones in house of fraser don’t accept it for some reason.

    • Alex says:
      26 Nov26 November 10:30

      Actually, thinking like that is a bit silly — if a retailer takes Amex, use your Amex. Otherwise it costs you 0.65% more. The Curve card is only interesting in the case of places that don’t take Amex (or where you’d rather use a debit card, e.g. paying HMRC for instance).

      I hadn’t processed the actual price, thanks Rob. Hopefully I can get one before end of Jan, when it’s time taxes. 43p per Avios is definitely a rate at which we’d all buy!

      • Bob says:
        26 Nov26 November 12:01

        Exactly. I’m also a beta Curve tester and find it worthwhile with BA Amex as Rob says .65 for the Avios isn’t a bad deal spending anywhere that doesn’t take Amex.
        If they do take Amex I’ll be using an Amex card not curve.
        Cheers

    • Alan says:
      26 Nov26 November 13:39

      Not for specific retailer spend, just overall spend.

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