As the Wirecard scandal continues, UK-based FinTech ANNA Money has been forced to suspend all of its cards and accounts. Its customers are not happy about it.
German payment giant Wirecard filed for insolvency on Thursday June 25 after a it was revealed a week earlier that €1.9bn ($2.1bn) of its balance sheet was missing. The news came after a week of turmoil that had seen Markus Braun stepping down as CEO of Wirecard on Friday June 19 before being arrested on Monday June 22, accused of having inflating Wirecard’s finances, thus misleading investors and customers. He was later released on a €5m ($5.66m) bail.
Early in the morning of Friday June 26, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) ordered Wirecard UK to freeze all of its assets and services.
Now ANNA Money has been caught in the fallout and has had to suspend all of its cards and accounts.
“We’re very sorry to say that your ANNA card and account have been temporarily suspended with immediate effect,” the company said in a statement. “We expect the suspension to be lifted – the inability to use your account and card is temporal, and we are working to restore it as soon as possible. Your ANNA card details and the money in your ANNA account remain safe and secure – but unfortunately you cannot currently access them.”
The company said that the suspension was because of the FCA’s actions, claiming that it was given no warning that the Wirecard UK freeze was going to happen. “We should add that this action is not in any way related to ANNA, but since ANNA depends on Wirecard Card Solutions Limited to process payments, it affects ANNA and your ability to access your money,” the company continued. “We are working as hard as possible to get things back up and running and hope this disruption is over as quickly as possible. We are monitoring the situation and will update you as soon as possible.”
However, the customers who have had their cards frozen are not happy.
“You lot are absolutely need to be reported even on your service absolute horror story but shifting blames on [Wirecard] when you can’t even do the basics is basically what you are [ANNA). Have the director call me immediately,” one person wrote on Twitter.
Another said, “What a tin pot company only found out this morning absolute joke! I’ve got staff to pay what do I tell them?”
There was even talk about setting up a joint claim for damages sustained because of ANNA Money having to suspend all cards and accounts.
“[What’s] happening ANNA [Money] – how can you run a bank with a single point of failure, do you not have any mitigation plans in a place as mandated by regulators. [My] business is locked out of its funds now… disastrous,” another person wrote.
in October 2019, ANNA Money raised £3.46m through an oversubscribed crowdfunding campaign on Seedrs.
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