If you’ve been saving up all your Nectar points for a while, you might want to double-check your account to see if they’re still there.
A Nectar scam that saw shoppers having their points stolen first started doing the rounds last year, and, unfortunately, it seems it’s still going strong in 2026.
A Sainsbury’s shopper has shared a warning for fellow Nectar Card members online, after spotting that thousands of points had been taken from her account this week.
In a post on TikTok, the supermarket customer, named Jade, claimed she received an email from Nectar thanking her for spending her points – even though she hadn’t touched them.
Baffled, she checked her account, and sure enough, her points balance had dropped to zero.
‘I went straight onto my Nectar app and discovered that all £69.84 worth of my points had gone,’ Jade, who posts under @ionlyworktopayfordisney, said in her video.
She claims the points had been used by someone else across two separate transactions – the first one using just 10 points, while the second payment used up all the rest.
‘They were obviously trying to see if they could get away with it for the first transaction,’ she explained, as she mourned the loss.
Jade claims she instantly contacted Nectar, who informed her that this issue was ‘unfortunately really common’ and explained it’s all to do with the serial numbers of accounts.
‘People are literally getting away with stealing hundreds or thousands of pounds worth of points, which is terrible,’ the shopper added.
How are Nectar points being stolen?
Frustratingly, anyone with a user’s account number or barcode could be able to spend their points.
This is because there are no ID checks needed to spend Nectar points. The only exception is at Argos if you’re spending more than £50.
The only way to avoid this happening is to lock your point spending.
This is a feature that was added to the Nectar app in 2025 to combat points being redeemed without your knowledge.
Have you ever had your Nectar points stolen?
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Yes
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No
How to lock your Nectar points
To lock your Nectar card, you need to have the app, which you can download from the App Store or Google Play for free.
Sign in on the app with your account, and on the home page, you should see your Nectar points balance.
Underneath, it will tell you whether or not your spending is locked.
If it’s unlocked, simply click on where it says ‘spending is unlocked’ and it will ask if you want to lock it.
You can decide to unlock this at any time by simply following the same steps. Once unlocked, you can redeem the balance.
Unlocking should be instantaneous, but there could be delays during busy times or in busy shops.
What happens when you lock your Nectar points?
When your points are locked, you can’t spend the points online or in-store, or with any of the Nectar partners, except for British Airways.
You can still collect points and get Nectar prices.
A spokesperson for Nectar previously said: ‘A Nectar spokesperson said: ‘Nectar is one of the UK’s biggest loyalty schemes, with over 24million members.
‘The security of our customer accounts is our highest priority, and the proportion of those impacted by fraud each year is very small.
‘We have a range of measures which detect, and in many cases prevent fraud, including our Spend Lock feature.
‘Our Nectar Helpline team are on hand to support any customer who suspects they may have been a victim of fraud.’
Metro has contacted Sainsbury’s and Nectar for further comment.
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