UK Digital Banking Apps Affected By Wirecard Subsidiary Freeze

After the U.K.’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) mandated that Wirecard’s British Wirecard Card Solutions unit stop conducting regulated work, a number of consumers in the U.K. haven’t been able to get ahold of their cash, CNBC reported.

The move affected multiple U.K. digital banking apps such as Anna, Curve, U Account and Pockit since they depend upon the technology of Wirecard to handle payment processing, per the CNBC report.

Apps like Anna and Curve depend upon eMoney licenses that let the platform take care of payments. But complete banking licenses would enable them to keep the funds of their clients. Anna counts 20,000 business banking clients, while Curve has in excess of 1.3 million accounts and Pockit has over half a million users, CNBC reported.

Curve, for its part, was able to get is cards back in operation after efforts by its workers to remedy the issue during the weekend. The company moved its payment processing to Checkout.com from Wirecard.

A Wirecard Card Solutions representative told the outlet, “We fully understand the inconvenience the temporary suspension of our services has caused for our valued customers. We are in constant dialogue with the FCA and are working hard with them and our advisors to have the steps in place which will enable the suspension to be lifted so business can resume.”

Wirecard AG informed customers that Wirecard Bank is not part of the insolvency proceedings and electronic fund transfers aren’t impacted. The company said, “Payouts to merchants of Wirecard Bank will continue to be executed without restrictions.”

On Friday (June 26), news surfaced that the FCA had mandated that Wirecard’s U.K. subsidiary freeze the German payment firm’s funds as the regulator figures out its plan of action. Due to the FCA action, clients of Wirecard Card Solutions would not have access to their accounts.

On Monday (June 29), the FCA said Wirecard AG was rectifying problems brought to light by the $2.1 billion accounting scandal, but limitations on the payments firm would remain.

The FCA said, “We cannot lift the restrictions without reassuring ourselves that the firm has been able to satisfy all our concerns, for example that all clients’ money is safe. We hope to be able to issue an update soon.”