Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

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

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

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.

Time to pick up 30,000 Virgin Points?

If you are now looking for a new Visa or Mastercard, don’t forget the excellent 30,000 Virgin Points bonus currently offered on the Virgin Atlantic Reward+ credit card which has a few days left to run. Our article is here and you can apply here.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

earns points from credit cards

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – May 2025 update

If you are looking to apply for a new credit card, here are our top recommendations based on the current sign-up bonuses.

In 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus card

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

Get 25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios card

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

Get 5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

You can see our full directory of all UK cards which earn airline or hotel points here. Here are the best of the other deals currently available.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Credit Card

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card

30,000 Avios and the famous annual Companion Voucher voucher Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Earning miles and points from small business cards

If you are a sole trader or run a small company, you may also want to check out these offers:

The American Express Business Platinum Card

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

The American Express Business Gold Card

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business Card

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

Category

IHG One Rewards

Comments (860)

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

  • Jim says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:15

    I received my letter today cancelling black. Applied and successful getting a white, done.

    • paul says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:18

      why would you want to give money to such a company after this ?

    • EwanG says:
      1 Oct1 October 15:38

      On the bright side, 10k bonus points for a £200 spend on your new card!

  • lee says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:16

    Creation now saying to me if I want my free night I’m not entitled to any refund of my year fee .

    I will be challenging this as the free night is an incentive the fee should be refunded if they dont honour my card for the whole 12 months .

    • Harrier25 says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:23

      I’ll be happy with just the free night voucher to be honest. It’s worth a lot more than the £33 pro-rata refund I’d be owed.

    • Anna says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:59

      What complete garbage, where in the Ts and Cs does it say anything about that?

      • Chrisasaurus says:
        1 Oct1 October 15:02

        Don’t you only get the free night cert after paying the fee?

        • Genghis says:
          1 Oct1 October 15:44

          The qualifying event is spending £10k in the card year having paid the card fee at the start of the year. Paying for another year is not part of the deal.

          • JDB says:
            1 Oct1 October 16:46

            @Genghis – The Ombudsman doesn’t agree with this analysis – see DRN2242979 but in any event it sounds as though they may give people the free night? Expecting a pro-rata fee refund and the free night might not work??

          • Genghis says:
            2 Oct2 October 13:22

            @JDB I can’t seem to find the case but based on what you wrote in later comments, it appears this is to do with the timing of the voucher being at the card anniversary, not that you need to pay for year 2 in order to earn the voucher earned in year 1.

  • Vin says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:17

    This looks like a way for Creation to trim the number of cardholders. It’s clear that they don’t like this card any more.

    At some point, they will just shut down this card entirely.

    I was switching my business from IHG to Marriott anyway.

  • Jon says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:19

    I’m definitely frustrated by this. I was using my IHG card under Curve for convenience and haven’t done any NS&I, Money Recycling or anything like that on it.

    It really seems like Curve is falling apart, I don’t want to use them with my VS card now in case the same happens.

    On the plus side, the Creation customer service is rubbish so at least we don’t have to deal with them.

  • DI says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:21

    Lol I only ever spent £25 via curve on my white card.

  • Yorkie Aid says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:24

    I just received the letters for the Black and White cards. I am still waiting for my free night voucher which should have posted back in March and I have subsequently earned another one. Assuming that these are not forthcoming, what would be the potential ramifications of valuing them at say £400 each to stay at the ICPL (where I used my last voucher) and leaving an outstanding balance of £800 on the card on 3rd December. Obviously I would write to them to explain why I was doing this and that I would be happy to then pay off the balance when the vouchers are finally added to my IHG rewards account.

    • Harrier25 says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:26

      Then you’d end up with missed payments, followed by a default on your credit file. Not a good idea.

    • DI says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:26

      Hmmm sounds like a bad idea. Say they give you the vouchers in a few months, how much would the interest be by then? And how exactly are you going to not pay it?

    • Dave says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:27

      I would settle the bill and then MCOL for the cost of the free night later. Otherwise you’re going to end up with a non-payment on your credit file.

      • Lady London says:
        1 Oct1 October 16:09

        Yes. And ensure you ask for cash value of the pro rata amount you’d spent towards a free night. Free night could be worth £350-£500 depemding where spent so you’d claim half that amount if you’d spent only £5k towards a free night. Ditto for annual fee they absolutely won’t be able to avoid refunding you pro rata.

        The admin on even 10% accrued towards free night claims will unfortunately be onerous for them.

        Obvs easier if you give them an opportunity to express any dissatisfaction with you and they don’t before you file the claim.

    • Yorkie Aid says:
      1 Oct1 October 15:29

      Thanks for the advice guys. I’ve got two months to think about it I guess. Hopefully they will just pony up the vouchers before the drop dead date and we can then move on.

    • David says:
      1 Oct1 October 22:19

      Do you really need to ask whether this is a good idea? Sweet Lord.

  • Tomas Hollingsworth says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:28

    They’ve saved me a phone call I’ve been meaning to make since the text message last month. Without Apple Pay the IHG card is useless to me.

  • ChrisD says:
    1 Oct1 October 14:31

    I wonder how/if IHG will respond to Creation trashing their brand…

    • Paul says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:44

      I’ve wondered this! It’s not good for IHG/Marriott. I suspect if they are going to continue with a Credit Card in their brand they will change supplier

    • Anna says:
      1 Oct1 October 14:56

      I was thinking that. I’ll probably send emails from me and my OH pointing out that we will be making fewer hotel bookings as a result of this (paid ones, obviously!)

    • JDB says:
      1 Oct1 October 16:07

      The IHG Rewards programme has c. 100 million members worldwide. I don’t think they will be too bothered about a couple of thousand disgruntled former cardholders. It is also inconceivable that they were unaware of the account closures prior to them happening.

    • Harrier25 says:
      1 Oct1 October 16:41

      IHG do a fantastic job at trashing the brand themselves without any assistance from Creation!

    • David says:
      1 Oct1 October 22:22

      I’m sure they won’t be that bothered with a group of grifters getting this route shut down.

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

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!