-
Maybe they wouldn’t want to repeat it. Regardless I’d rather the £50 was in my local hospice’s pocket than Creations.
As well as that I do feel the claim was justified for them wasting my time. They could have backed down when I pointed out my final statement that came after the closure notice and stopping of points transfer said on it “continue to use your card for the following benefits” it listed 1 point per £ spent as a benefit. They were simply refusing to do what they said in writing they would do. If they had backed down I’d have settled for the points.
Lastly I want it to cost them as much as it can so they get what they deserve. 50 quid isn’t a lot but if there were 1000 affected customers that would cost them 50 grand.
Who pays the hotel for the free nights – Creation or IHG?
So have just had one FOS complaint finished and 2nd for wife is nearly done.
My one I asked for points (only about 2k), free night and pro rata refund. Wife’s was free night and pro rata refund. Both also asked for compensation (I originally said if happily accept a 2nd free night voucher).
On my complaint the investigator offered £50 compensation but Creation rejected. Went to ombudsman and then the ombudsman rejected the compensation. Stated the following:
“However, I didn’t think £50 compensation was fair. I explained that it isn’t the role of
our service to punish a business, nor do we compensate for the inconvenience experienced
in raising a complaint. I explained, our service doesn’t make awards for mistakes which haven’t caused more than the normal nuisances of everyday life.”I went back to ask whether a company trying to deliberately deprive customers of benefits was more than a normal nuisance (and to have that defined) and also what’s the point of an ombudsman if it allows financial services just to do what they want and only have to give what they should when challenged. The reply from the ombudsman included the following:
“You’ve asked questions about comments I made in my final decision, however I won’t be commenting or providing further explanation. I understand this is disappointing but once a final decision is issued, this is the end of our process.”
Knowing the statutory requirements that public bodies such as FOS have to abide by I’m going to be complaining about their service. Also going to do a MCOL claim on Creation for time and hassle for compensation. And it’ll be more than the £50 I was happy to accept now.
The whole saga has been ridiculous and whilst have points and free night have no idea when I’m getting the pro rata refund (which due to inflation is now less than it should have been in November 2021).
Wife investigator said no compensation and rejected as I was offered £50 but now expecting ombudsman to say no compensation in line with mine.
Also shows inconsistencies in the FOS if some are getting compensation and others aren’t…
@Scallder not sure what your claim at MCOL will be?? The court (unlike the FOS) doesn’t have the power to order inconvenience payments. You have need to demonstrate a specific directly attributable loss and the cost of your time won’t qualify. Equally, if you complain about the FOS’s service, what will you actually be complaining about? What they have told you is exactly correct and they have properly carried out their role.
You should also be wary of accusing businesses of “deliberately” doing x, y or z. In any consumer or civil dispute/litigation, the two parties have different points of view/interpretation of the law as happened here. The FOS has brokered a resolution but doesn’t see the inconvenience to you as being very great based on their wide experience.
Those who took their cases to MCOL didn’t get a conclusive result which suggests that judges saw some merit in the arguments on both sides so Creation’s position can’t really be as you suggest.
@jj I enjoyed both your posts yesterday and today, thank you for them. We are privileged that you and JDB are here.
Did you not mean in your post of yesterday, that IHG’s scheme has become ungenerous rather than generous in the time it’s taken for Creation to pay out points that were earned? The IHG hotels I use have at least doubled or tripled the points cost of a room. Yes that does make the free night worth more but points now buy much less.
@Scallder unfortunately the FOS awards in most cases nothing for inconvenience and distress. Even when they did, I’ve seen reports where someone had to fight a provider for years far beyond the strength most consumers would have, monster admin, monster stress, possibly even some advice costs, and FOS was reported to have awarded £50-£75 for D&I, and the £n00,000 they won being only what they should have got from the provider years ago.
Also the UK legal system generally seems to shy away from punitive awards. Seems we don’t want to become like the US. And FOS definitely won’t.
However @jj’s words should give you much comfort :
jj: “I would be both gobsmacked and dismayed if I learned that awkward questions are not now being asked by the Board about unnecessary legal spend, reputational consequences, wasted internal resources, management judgement, business ethics, and bridges burned with FOS” .
Creation retains other business in the UK. So if they’ve got any sense they will now tread carefully if tbey don’t exit the UK.
Ditto MCOL your time and effort and even most costs to pursue won’t be awarded. (This cuts both ways as part of the purpose of MCOL is also to protect you from having the other side’s costs claimed against you.) At a higher court yes possibly costs you’d paid out, eg for professional advice or representation might be claimable, but not your own time/effort/stress except in very few circumstances, but this matter does not merit the effort and risk of a higher court.
Apart fron that, did the FOS award what you were owed @Scallder?
Not directly relevant to Creation…
Also the UK legal system generally seems to shy away from punitive awards. Seems we don’t want to become like the US. And FOS definitely won’t.
I feel that by and large, that is correct. However, it does sometimes happen: I was reading about this one just yesterday afternoon:-
In Tahir v Aghri and Colavizza County Court at Central London, [2023] EW Misc 2 (CC) [NOT a financial case as such, but one of Unlawful eviction], the judge awarded, among a number of other awards, £25,000 for harassment: ‘beyond the unpleasant and unsettling… [it] would have been positively frightening’ and a further £10,000 aggravated and exemplary damages, which most non-lawyers would probably regard as punitive.
@RusselH my local Crown Court awarded another tenant in my building £70k in costs and compensation for being illegally evicted with light harassment in a few earlier years. It wasn’t paid at least for a few years, I’m guessing it was eventually paid as annual interest could have racked it up to nearly £90-100,000 by the time I heard about the result.
The rent on the property concerned was low and the out of pocket costs element probably didn’t exceed £30k so a well made case and some element of D&I, but I think a housing pressure group provided a specialist lawyer and guessing the case you mention may have had such support.
@RusselH my local Crown Court awarded another tenant in my building £70k in costs and compensation for being illegally evicted with light harassment in a few earlier years. It wasn’t paid at least for a few years, I’m guessing it was eventually paid as annual interest could have racked it up to nearly £90-100,000 by the time I heard about the result.
The rent on the property concerned was low and the out of pocket costs element probably didn’t exceed £30k so a well made case and some element of D&I, but I think a housing pressure group provided a specialist lawyer and guessing the case you mention may have had such support.
I think this is good, and not in the same thread as punitive damages as such (I assume the Court award it as damages for genuine stress/inconvenience/etc. put on the claimant). I agree with your earlier comment that the UK shouldn’t go down the US route of imposing punitive damages, I believe (and I’m not an expert) that financial firms can be fined for non-compliance with certain things, but that is probably far outside the scope of customers claiming for hotel points.
I’ve been watching how cases have unfolded, both on here and elsewhere, and it seems that the outcomes have been almost as consistent as pulling names from a hat.
I was not given the initial offer by Creation, neither was my OH. We’d both had FOS complaints in the system for over a year by then, and had just started getting responses. I wasn’t pushing for compensation over and above the free night and missing points (six figures). When I started hearing of responses being given to those who submitted complaints directly to Creation recently, I thought nothing to lose, so did the same, concurrently with the FOS complaint. FOS investigator was advised of this, and stated that they prob wouldn’t respond, so I didn’t expect much.
To my surprise, Creation did respond and upheld both my and my OH’s complaints. I considered that a fair outcome, albeit 18 months too late. I’m not interested in wasting any more of my, Creation’s or the FOS’ time on this, and never expected compo anyway, so I accepted, then contacted my FOS investigator to withdraw my complaint on the grounds that Creation had settled it.
I can only speculate on what the FOS outcome would have been, but at that point I didn’t want to push my luck, we got a fair outcome – the 18 month delay probably (in my view) warranted something extra, but as I say, I wanted the points and free night certificate I was never advised I wouldn’t earn, so I consider us even, and my drawn out saga with Creation at a close.
Did you not mean in your post of yesterday, that IHG’s scheme has become ungenerous rather than generous in the time it’s taken for Creation to pay out points that were earned? The IHG hotels I use have at least doubled or tripled the points cost of a room. Yes that does make the free night worth more but points now buy much less.
The value of an IHG point is about what it was. The bug difference is in the value of the free night voucher which, for most people, was worth far more than any pending points.
Since Creationgate, hotel prices have risen much more rapidly than inflation. Perhaps more importantly, in the revised IHG scheme, redemption stays, including free nights, attract privileges due under the scheme. If you’re a diamond member (which many are, courtesy of the creation card and Ambassador extensions), that means you should have a room upgrade, early check-in, late check-out and free breakfast. That’s a massive improvement.
In the case cited above, the damages were based on a statutory formula in the Housing Act 2014 and damages under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. There was coincidentally also an inconvenience payment of £500. Trying to equate what the tenants in that case suffered to the issues experienced by Creation cardholders is grotesque.
The FOS is more than capable of applying the law in relation to financial matters, and in applying inconvenience payments as it deems fair. There is no provision for the Court to award such inconvenience payments in these financial cases. What do these housing cases have to do with this thread?
I went back to ask whether a company trying to deliberately deprive customers of benefits was more than a normal nuisance (and to have that defined) and also what’s the point of an ombudsman if it allows financial services just to do what they want and only have to give what they should when challenged.
The whole point about this case is that Creation clearly felt that its terms and conditions allowed it to treat borrowers in the way it did. Don’t forget that many of these borrowers had been abusing the card, admittedly due to Creation’s own incompetence, and an ongoing commercial relationship was untenable. In almost any other industry, Creation would have been well within its rights to behave in the way it did.
Your description of Creation as, “a company trying to deliberately deprive customers of benefits” is made without any evidential foundation. It is very unlikely that FOS would come to such a conclusion, as, presumably, the reason the cases took so long to resolve is that Creation was arguing that it had done nothing wrong.
We all face inconveniences from businesses all the time. Yesterday I had to spend 10 minute on the phone to my local car dealer to book a service. I could argue that was because they had deliberately tried to deprive me of an efficient service by failing to employ sufficient staff. Does that make me entitled to compensation? Unless someone is prepared to be pragmatic and realistic, this will never end and the cost of all financial services products will increase to the benefit of no-one.
I raised a complaint back when the cards were closed and outstanding points not awarded. This was obviously rejected and I couldn’t be arsed to do anymore about it.
However, in light of some recent feedback in this thread I raised a new complaint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and I got an email the other day saying they’re upholding this new complaint. Something about not having been clear with their comms.
They’ve said I’ll get the 20k+ outstanding points transferred in the next few weeks.Big thanks to all those who spent ages chasing Creation and the ombudsman, as that is probably what made Creation decide to hand over the points.
Creation are a bunch of c**** and the ombudsman are a toothless disgrace.Creation said they’d transfer my points within 6 weeks.
It has been more than 6 weeks and they still haven’t done so.Not surprised really. A thoroughly untrustworthy bunch of c****
PS Since we’ve said some thankyous today a shout out to @Stillinthesun who generously spent some of his own time providing detailed spadework that really helped quite a few here get this going.
I raised a complaint back when the cards were closed and outstanding points not awarded. This was obviously rejected and I couldn’t be arsed to do anymore about it.
However, in light of some recent feedback in this thread I raised a new complaint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and I got an email the other day saying they’re upholding this new complaint. Something about not having been clear with their comms.
They’ve said I’ll get the 20k+ outstanding points transferred in the next few weeks.Big thanks to all those who spent ages chasing Creation and the ombudsman, as that is probably what made Creation decide to hand over the points.
Creation are a bunch of c**** and the ombudsman are a toothless disgrace.Creation said they’d transfer my points within 6 weeks.
It has been more than 6 weeks and they still haven’t done so.Not surprised really. A thoroughly untrustworthy bunch of c****
+1!
I raised a complaint back when the cards were closed and outstanding points not awarded. This was obviously rejected and I couldn’t be arsed to do anymore about it.
However, in light of some recent feedback in this thread I raised a new complaint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and I got an email the other day saying they’re upholding this new complaint. Something about not having been clear with their comms.
They’ve said I’ll get the 20k+ outstanding points transferred in the next few weeks.Big thanks to all those who spent ages chasing Creation and the ombudsman, as that is probably what made Creation decide to hand over the points.
Creation are a bunch of c**** and the ombudsman are a toothless disgrace.Creation said they’d transfer my points within 6 weeks.
It has been more than 6 weeks and they still haven’t done so.Not surprised really. A thoroughly untrustworthy bunch of c****
+1!
+2
I raised a complaint back when the cards were closed and outstanding points not awarded. This was obviously rejected and I couldn’t be arsed to do anymore about it.
However, in light of some recent feedback in this thread I raised a new complaint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and I got an email the other day saying they’re upholding this new complaint. Something about not having been clear with their comms.
They’ve said I’ll get the 20k+ outstanding points transferred in the next few weeks.Big thanks to all those who spent ages chasing Creation and the ombudsman, as that is probably what made Creation decide to hand over the points.
Creation are a bunch of c**** and the ombudsman are a toothless disgrace.Creation said they’d transfer my points within 6 weeks.
It has been more than 6 weeks and they still haven’t done so.Not surprised really. A thoroughly untrustworthy bunch of c****
+1!
+2
Couldn’t make it up!
They are claiming points were sent to IHG within 6 weeks. IHG are responsible for adding points and they are unsure of IHG timescales to add points to my account. Advice was to chase IHG up for the missing points.
+3
Couldn’t make it up!
They are claiming points were sent to IHG within 6 weeks. IHG are responsible for adding points and they are unsure of IHG timescales to add points to my account. Advice was to chase IHG up for the missing points.
I raised a complaint back when the cards were closed and outstanding points not awarded. This was obviously rejected and I couldn’t be arsed to do anymore about it.
However, in light of some recent feedback in this thread I raised a new complaint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and I got an email the other day saying they’re upholding this new complaint. Something about not having been clear with their comms.
They’ve said I’ll get the 20k+ outstanding points transferred in the next few weeks.Big thanks to all those who spent ages chasing Creation and the ombudsman, as that is probably what made Creation decide to hand over the points.
Creation are a bunch of c**** and the ombudsman are a toothless disgrace.Creation said they’d transfer my points within 6 weeks.
It has been more than 6 weeks and they still haven’t done so.Not surprised really. A thoroughly untrustworthy bunch of c****
+1!
+2
+3
Hi
I’ve specifically registered here to see if anyone else has had my experience with the downgrading of the card to Creation only. I hope this isn’t a duplicate – I did look and couldn’t see anything which might indicate that mine is an isolated experience.
Timeline as follows:
Statement 6th June 2023. Paid off in full 3 days before due date.
Last date for points 27th June
Statement 3rd July 2023. Due payment date 24th July 2023. Minimum payment £5.00I went in to online services to check the final amount and to check refund of annual pro-rata fee had been credited and was surprised to see:
A) New Creation branding present. No trace if IHG (and neither should there be)
B) Interest totalling £11.97 added to balance yesterday
C) New due date given as 7th August. Minimum payment of £19.99Obviously this was alarming, so I rang them and it seems that with the changeover of account types a new, but invisible, statement had been issued and effectively I have defaulted on that payment even though I never knew it was there and there was a pre-existing date for payment in 6 days time.
Even stranger is that their systems still show a payment due on 24th July AND 7th August.
Rep agreed that I should not have been charged interest and that she had no idea how the situation had occurred. She promised to scrub the interest but disturbingly also said that she would arrange for the default to be removed from my credit report!
I have also not had points or voucher sent and it has now been much longer than 6 weeks. Creation said chase it up with IHG.
Has anyone spoke to IHG with success or is it another wasted effort?
Couldn’t make it up!
They are claiming points were sent to IHG within 6 weeks. IHG are responsible for adding points and they are unsure of IHG timescales to add points to my account. Advice was to chase IHG up for the missing points.
Ask Creation for full proof that they were sent.
There is a report that shows what was sent and when. I remember receiving it in my DSAR a few years ago
Couldn’t make it up!
They are claiming points were sent to IHG within 6 weeks. IHG are responsible for adding points and they are unsure of IHG timescales to add points to my account. Advice was to chase IHG up for the missing points.
I just got told this too.
I’m wondering if people in this thread have definitely had points credited to their IHG accounts, or whether they’ve only been told that it will happen and they got a bit excited before the fact?
We’ve both definitely had ours (and the free nights), and other people have posted the same.
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