Bank of Ireland (BoI) has rolled back on a rewards scheme that was meant to come into effect for customers next month due to an “error”.
BoI customers with an Aer Card were told they could receive an annual bonus of 40,000 Avios points used to buy flights if they spend around €10,000 under terms and conditions published by the lender between August 6 and 15.
The revised terms and conditions to Bank of Ireland’s website for the Aer Credit Card travel rewards were intended to apply from October 23, but the bank said it is “no longer making those changes”.
“The revised terms and conditions were removed from the website. The existing terms and condition for the Aer Credit Card remain in place, and if there are any changes to the offering in the future we will be in touch with customers at that time,” Bank of Ireland said.
The bank said the mistake affects only the terms and conditions for the travel rewards, and not other terms of the Aer Credit Card contract.
BoI has written to all its Aer Credit Card customers to “apologise for the error and for any inconvenience and confusion it may have caused”.
The Aer Credit Card is an Aer Lingus credit card delivered through a contract with Bank of Ireland.
The bank did not clarify what the “error” was that led them to cancel the proposed changes to its terms and conditions.
Meanwhile, Bank of Ireland posted €1.1bn in profits before tax in the first six months, underpinned by a high interest rate environment and a more swollen loan book following the acquisitions of mortgages from KBC.
However, growth momentum may be waning as profits surged from €351m in the first six months of 2022 to €1bn at the half point of last year, fuelled by income coming from interest rate hikes.
The ECB earlier this week announced another interest rate cut of 0.25% following the first reduction in June of 25 basis points. The regulator began hiking rates in July 2022 but banks on the retail banking market in the Republic were overall slow to pass the increases on to customers.
ECB president Christine Lagarde left the door open for another interest rate cut as soon as October.
