A class action lawsuit filed against Capital One on May 7, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia is challenging what plaintiffs describe as a systematic practice of erasing credit card rewards when accounts are closed, regardless of whether the cardholder did anything wrong.
The plaintiffs are Nikhil Navkal and NTech Consulting LLC. The case, filed as NTech Consulting LLC, et al. v. Capital One N.A., Case No. 3:26-cv-00308, seeks to represent a national class of cardholders who lost earned rewards following account closures while not in default, along with a New York subclass and a subclass of Capital One Spark Cash Plus cardholders.
What the lawsuit alleges and who it seeks to represent
The complaint centers on a specific claim: that Capital One promised rewards through its cardholder agreements and marketing materials, accepted purchases that generated those rewards, and then canceled both the accounts and the accrued points or cash when it closed accounts, including in situations where the cardholder bore no responsibility for the closure.
The filing identifies a pattern in which Capital One terminates accounts and the associated rewards after a card has been subjected to fraud or unauthorized use. In those cases, the cardholder is effectively penalized for a problem they did not create. The complaint also describes instances where Capital One closed accounts citing activity described as inconsistent with typical customer usage, a phrase the plaintiffs argue gives the company broad discretion to cancel accounts and forfeit rewards without clear justification.
The plaintiffs argue that Capital One was contractually barred from reclaiming rewards that had already been earned through purchases. The lawsuit states that even in cases of genuine default, which the plaintiffs say did not apply to them, the company lacked the contractual authority to unilaterally take back rewards.
The legal claims and what the plaintiffs are asking for
The complaint includes allegations of breach of contract and unjust enrichment. It also includes violations of New York General Business Law and the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, specifically Regulation B. The plaintiffs are seeking a jury trial and requesting declaratory and injunctive relief in addition to statutory, exemplary, and punitive damages for all class members.
The legal team representing the plaintiffs includes Gregory S. Duncan, Daryl F. Scott, Joseph P. Guglielmo, Anjori Mitra, and Joseph S. Tusa.
The case arrives roughly 16 months after a separate lawsuit filed in January 2025 accused Capital One of leaving thousands of customers locked out of their bank accounts for multiple days, unable to access funds, process payments, or receive direct deposits. That earlier case focused on account access failures. This new filing shifts the focus to what happens to earned financial value after an account is terminated.
Why this matters for Capital One cardholders broadly
The class definition is broad enough to capture a large number of potential plaintiffs. Anyone who held a Capital One credit card, had that account closed while not in default, and did not receive payment or redemption of all earned rewards may qualify for inclusion in the national class. The Spark Cash Plus subclass suggests the lawsuit is also targeting specific card products where the rewards structure and cancellation practices may have operated differently.
The underlying question the case asks a court to answer is not procedurally complex, but it has real financial stakes for cardholders who accumulated significant rewards balances before their accounts were closed. If Capital One’s agreements promised those rewards and the company retained them after closure, the plaintiffs argue that the loss was not a policy decision the company was entitled to make on its own. It was a breach.
Capital One has not publicly responded to the lawsuit’s specific allegations. The case is pending in federal court in Virginia.
