Coutts & Co Launches New Cards Loyalty Scheme

Private bank to offer option for clients to donate points to Charity

Coutts & Co has today announced a new loyalty scheme for its Gold Card and exclusive World Card.

The news Coutts point scheme, ‘Courtesy of Coutts’ allows clients to collect one point for each £1 spent, with which they can either buy travel with Ebookers or easyJet, or choose to donate their points to one of three selected charities.

The chosen charities are, the Alzheimer’s Research Trust, the UK’s leading research charity into dementia, Rainbow Trust Children’s Charity, which provides practical and emotional support to families of children with a life-threatening or terminal illness and the Woodland Trust, one of the UK’s leading woodland conservation charities.

Perry Littleboy, head of marketing and business development, commented: “About 18 months ago we canvassed the opinions of 5,000 of our cardholders to ask what they wanted from a card loyalty scheme. Their response was that they wanted the greatest choice possible.

“The new scheme achieves exactly that and has been designed to give clients the flexibility to put the points that they are collecting to good use.. Over a third of our cardholders did not register for the previous loyalty scheme and therefore we have now given clients the ability to donate their points to one of three charities, if they do not wish to use them for travel. And with the sums that clients spend on their cards, the points are likely to amount quickly, providing valuable support to those causes.”

The three charities were shortlisted after Coutts, having researched the kinds of charities that would be of most interest to its clients, picked three themes that it would cover for the launch phase.

Going forward, Coutts intends to expand the loyalty scheme even further, expanding the choice of charities to which clients can donate points and also by giving clients access to exclusive luxury goods that they can purchase with the points that they collect.

Clare Allen, Head of Corporate Partnerships at the Woodland Trust, said: "We're delighted to be selected and to sit alongside two other great charities. The option of allowing people to donate their points is a superb idea. We were founded in the seventies to both protect what little woodland we have left and plant millions more trees - the UK lags way behind the rest of Europe when it comes to tree cover. Particularly in the face of climate change we have much more to do so the support of Coutts and its clients will be fantastic."

Rebecca Wood, Chief Executive of the Alzheimer's Research Trust said: " We're honoured and delighted that Coutts has decided to support the Alhzhiemer's Research Trust in its work to overcome this devistating but massively under-funded condition.

"This is welcome news for us, it's good news for our tireless scientists workingup and d own the country in our dementia research network centres, and most importantly its a real lifeline for the half a million people in the UK whose lives are blighted by this incurable disease and who desperatly await the next scienific breakthrough" 

Claire Ross Baker Director of Fundraising and Markeing at Rainbow Trust Children's Charity, said: "We are delighted to be one of Coutts' recipient charities for its new loyalty scheme. Corporate partnerships like this are very important to Rainbow Trust. They help us raise valuable funds so that we can continue to provide the care and support to families who have a child with a life threatening or terminal illness in order to maintain a sense of normality and keep families together."

Examples:

Charity	‘Gift’	Points required
Rainbow Trust	Buy a sick child a magical 24 hr stay at one of the trust’s respite homes	12,500
Alzheimer’s Research Trust	Help fund a PhD scholar - encouraging the brightest young scientists to enter the field of Alzheimer's research.	8,350
Woodland Trust	Regeneration of an area of bluebell woodland by clearing debris thus enabling dormant bluebells to flourish.	8,400

For further information please contact:

Claire Symonds, Coutts & Co, 020 77531774
e-mail Claire.symonds@coutts.com

 Notes to Editors

·Coutts is the international private banking arm of The Royal Bank of Scotland Group. The Royal Bank of Scotland Group is one of the world's largest banking groups.

·Coutts manages the wealth of 96,000 high net worth clients worldwide through a network of over 40 offices globally.

·The first Coutts regional office to be opened was Eton in 1961. Today, Coutts has regional offices in Birmingham, Bournemouth, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Eton, Guildford, Hampshire, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Milton Keynes, Newcastle, Nottingham, Oxford and Tunbridge Wells.

·Coutts offers clients a range of products and services covering sophisticated investment products together with expertise in trust and fiduciary services and UK tax and banking services.

·Coutts & Co is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Coutts & Co Registered in England No 36695Registered Office 440 Strand London WC2R 0QS.

·Calls may be recorded.

www.coutts.com