Barclaycard, one of the four founding members of the UK's Nectar card programme, is pulling out of the loyalty scheme.
The bank, the largest credit card issuer in the UK, stopped accepting new Nectar registrations from the beginning of July, and will stop awarding points to cardholders from the end of August.
Instead, Barclays intends to offer card-specific benefits, such as free travel insurance for holidays booked by card via the Barclaycard Travel Service.
Nectar was launched by Loyalty Management UK in association with Barclays, Sainsbury's, BP and Debenhams, almost two years ago. The scheme now claims some 18 million households as members.
Barclays says it decided to pull out of the programme after extensive research among its membership-base found cardholders valued card-specific benefits more highly.
Loyalty Management UK has shrugged off the loss and instead lined up American Express for the launch in September of a co-branded Amex/Nectar card.