Capital on Tap vs high-street bank business credit cards: NatWest, Lloyds and HSBC compared

At a glance

We compare Capital on Tap with four bank cards in the table: the NatWest Business Credit Card, the NatWest Business Plus Credit Card, the Lloyds Bank Business Credit Card and the HSBC Commercial Card, with Santander and Metro Bank covered briefly below. Every bank figure is from the bank’s own product page, checked on 15 September 2026. I use the Capital on Tap free card and have not held any of the bank cards.

• Account requirement: all six banks require their own business current account. Capital on Tap requires none.
• Annual fee: NatWest £30 per card, NatWest Plus £70 per card, Lloyds £32 per cardholder, HSBC £32 per card. Capital on Tap £0 annual fee.
• Non-sterling fee: NatWest 2.95%, Lloyds 2.95%, HSBC 2.99%; NatWest Plus 0% on purchases. Capital on Tap 0% non-sterling transaction fee.
• Rewards: fuel-led categories or nothing at the banks; a flat 1% cashback on everything at Capital on Tap.
• Representative APR: every bank publishes one. Capital on Tap does not.

Side by side

“Not stated” means the bank’s product page does not say, which is common for personal guarantees, integrations and limits. Where a fee is charged per card, the employee-card row points back to the annual-fee row rather than repeating it.

The account-holding requirement

This is the first filter and it removes most people from most of the table. NatWest’s card is for a business with an existing natwest business current account in the same legal entity. The Business Plus card: NatWest business current account required; turnover up to £2 million. Lloyds: Existing Lloyds business current account holder. HSBC: HSBC business current account required. Santander and Metro Bank are the same. In each case the credit card is a product for existing customers, and the application is an extension of the banking relationship.

Capital on Tap is not a bank and does not care where you bank. You give it your average monthly turnover and business bank details, and the card is repaid from that account by Direct Debit or Open Banking. That means the honest comparison is not “Capital on Tap or my bank’s card” but “my bank’s card, or Capital on Tap alongside my bank”. If you are not already a customer of one of these banks, the bank card involves opening a new current account first, with all the documentation that entails, to get a card that is in most respects less generous.

Annual fees per card

The banks charge by the card, which matters as soon as more than one person spends. NatWest: £30 per card; free in year one and waived with £6,000+ annual spend. NatWest Business Plus: £70 per card. Lloyds: £32 per cardholder; free for the first 12 months and waived with £6,000+ annual spend. HSBC: £32 per card, waived in year one, and HSBC is explicit that employee cards are £32 per card after year one. A business with five cardholders on the standard NatWest or Lloyds card that does not clear the spend waiver is paying £150 to £160 a year in card fees; on NatWest Business Plus it is £350 a year with no waiver mentioned.

Capital on Tap: £0 annual fee and unlimited free employee cards. Five cardholders cost nothing, fifty cost nothing. The other charges are £0 ATM fee, £0 charge for missing the minimum payment and no over-limit fee (the card is declined instead), all set out on the fees page. The banks’ spend waivers are real, and a single-card business spending over £6,000 a year on NatWest or Lloyds pays no fee, but the waiver is something to track, and the fee returns in a quiet year.

Non-sterling fees: 2.95% to 2.99% against nothing

NatWest’s standard card charges 2.95%. Lloyds charges 2.95%. HSBC charges 2.99%. Those are the typical high-street rates and they are why our FX fee calculator uses that range as its default. For a business that pays for US software, cloud services or overseas suppliers by card, the fee is a straight tax on those payments: on £2,000 a month of non-sterling spend, about £60 a month, over £700 a year.

Two bank cards remove it. NatWest Business Plus charges 0% on purchases, for a £70 per card fee. Santander Business Cashback charges 0% on purchases in the local currency, for £30 a year. Metro Bank is 0% in SEPA Europe; 2.99% elsewhere. Capital on Tap charges 0% non-sterling transaction fee on the free card with no annual fee, and £0 ATM fee at home or abroad, though interest on cash withdrawals from the day you take them. Cash on the bank cards costs 3% (min £3) at NatWest, 2.5% (min £2.50) at Lloyds and 2.99% (min £3) at HSBC.

Cashback categories vs a flat 1%

Bank cashback is built around fuel. NatWest’s standard card pays 1% cashback on fuel and ev charging only. Lloyds pays 1% on fuel and ev charging, 0.5% elsewhere, in months you spend £2,000+. HSBC pays none. NatWest Business Plus is the richest scheme: 3% fuel and EV, 2% trade supplies, 1% travel, 0.5% other; capped at £600 a year per account. Santander pays 1% cashback, uncapped, paid monthly. Metro pays none.

Capital on Tap pays 1 point per £1 on everything, worth 1% cashback, with no categories, no monthly threshold and no annual cap. Each transaction is each transaction rounded down to the nearest pound, and there are no points on cash withdrawals or fees. Points can be taken as cash (£10 minimum for cash to a bank account), balance credit, gift cards, Avios, Virgin Points or Radisson Rewards, with the detail on the rewards page.

Which is better depends entirely on what you buy. A trades business filling vans and buying materials could do well on NatWest Business Plus, at least until the annual cap, and should do the sums. An office-based business spending on software, advertising, travel and contractors earns at the banks’ lowest tier or nothing at all, and a flat 1% beats that comfortably. Lloyds’ monthly threshold adds the same problem Barclaycard has: quiet months earn nothing. The cashback calculator turns your own monthly spend into a yearly figure on Capital on Tap.

Representative APRs: the banks publish one, Capital on Tap does not

Every bank card here shows a representative APR on its product page in the standard format. NatWest Business: 24.3% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 16.9%. NatWest Business Plus: 29% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 13.9%. Lloyds: 15.95% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 14.9%. HSBC: 22% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 15.9%. Santander: 23.7% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 18.9%. Metro Bank: 18.9% APR representative (variable). Lloyds’ figure stands out as the lowest, and for a business that expects to borrow on the card for more than a month or two, that is a real point in Lloyds’ favour.

Capital on Tap advertises rates as low as 13.86% APR (variable) and does not publish a representative APR. Your rate depends on your personal and business credit history and the Bank of England base rate, and it is built from your fixed business rate plus the Bank of England Bank Rate, so it tracks Bank Rate, though rate only changes at the start of a billing period. You find out your own rate after a soft search on your personal credit file when you apply. We do not repeat third-party figures for Capital on Tap’s representative APR because they contradict one another. For a business that pays in full every month, none of this matters: no interest on purchases if you pay the statement balance in full by the due date, on Capital on Tap and on the bank cards alike. For a business that will carry a balance, the banks’ transparency is a genuine advantage, and our guide to avoiding interest is worth reading before choosing any of them.

Application effort

For an existing customer, a bank card is usually the least effort of all: the bank already has your identity, your accounts and your turnover, and the card is an add-on. For anyone else, the bank card means opening a business current account first, which in practice means identity checks on every director, proof of address, and often a wait, before the card application even starts.

Capital on Tap’s application is online, asks for your average monthly turnover and business bank details, runs a soft search on your personal credit file when you apply, and advertises a decision in around 2 minutes. The physical card arrives as a physical card in 2 to 5 business days, and virtual cards are available at once. Eligibility is a Ltd, LLP or PLC, active on Companies House, with £24,000 minimum annual turnover, no unsatisfied CCJs in the last 12 months, applied for by an active UK director or a shareholder with 25% or more; it is not available to sole traders, whereas all six banks accept sole traders who hold their account. A personal guarantee is required (personal guarantee required); none of NatWest, Lloyds or HSBC states its position on the product page, and Santander requires one from all directors. Our application guide walks through the form, and the limited company guide covers what a director should understand before signing with any issuer.

Credit limits

Lloyds states limits up to £25,000. Santander states limits £500 to £25,000. NatWest, HSBC and Metro do not state a range on their product pages. Capital on Tap advertises limits up to £250,000, which is a higher ceiling than any bank states here.

The ceiling is not the number that matters. My own starting limit was lower than I expected, and increases have been slow and hard to get. Capital on Tap runs automatic account reviews for higher limits, recommends 3 to 6 months of on-time history between requests, uses Open Banking data is used to assess limit increases, and warns that a manual review can lower your limit as well as raise it. The offered workaround is Preloading lets you spend beyond your limit with your own money. A bank that has watched your turnover flow through its own account for years has information Capital on Tap has to ask for, and it is reasonable to expect that it may be more generous with an opening limit for a customer it knows. If a substantial limit on day one is the deciding factor, ask your bank before you apply anywhere. The full story is on the credit limit page.

Santander and Metro Bank, briefly

Santander Business Cashback Credit Card. £30 a year; 23.7% APR representative (variable); purchase rate 18.9%; 1% cashback, uncapped, paid monthly; 0% on purchases in the local currency; cash 3% (min £3); cash interest rate 27.9%; additional cards free. Eligibility: Existing Santander business current account; sole trader, partnership, LLP or Ltd with up to two partners or directors. Limits £500 to £25,000. Personal guarantee: required from all directors or members of a ltd or llp. On paper this is the bank card closest to Capital on Tap: flat 1%, no FX fee on purchases, free extra cards. The differences are the £30 fee, the account requirement, the cap on the number of directors, and a limit that tops out at £25,000.

Metro Bank Business Credit Card. £0 annual fee; 18.9% APR representative (variable); none; non-sterling 0% in SEPA Europe; 2.99% elsewhere; cash free in europe; 2.99% + £1.50 elsewhere. Eligibility: Metro Bank business or commercial current account required. A simple, fee-free card for Metro customers who travel in Europe. With no cashback it is not a first choice against any card that pays something, but the published APR is competitive among the banks.

Who should choose which

The bank cards are not bad products; they are convenient products for existing customers with a specific spending pattern. For most limited companies whose spend looks like an office rather than a van, Capital on Tap alongside the existing bank account wins on fee, FX and rewards, and loses on limit transparency and the published APR. That trade is set out in full in the review, and the whole market, including Amex, Barclaycard and the challenger debit cards, is on the best business credit cards UK page.