They had been using the service for about a year, having registered as the hunt supporters club and passed the vetting procedures, The Telegraph understands.
The Oakley, which has since been provided with a card reader by their bank, later discovered that hunts were on SumUp’s restricted business list.
Polly Portwin, director of the campaign for hunting at the Countryside Alliance, said that it was one of “a number of incidents where events organised by hunts – many of which were raising money for charitable causes – had their accounts suspended mid-way through fundraising, leaving organisers without any means to collect payment and therefore having an impact on the donations subsequently made to good causes”.
She added: “It is disgraceful that members of rural communities and those who take part in a lawful activity can be discriminated against in this way and effectively treated as criminals.”
Mr Farage said that since launching his campaign to establish the extent of the “national scandal” of de-banking he had received a number of complaints about SumUp.
‘Great danger to society’
“These banks and financial services companies are completely out of control,” Mr Farage told The Telegraph. “They are starting to dictate how we can spend our money and what we can do.
“This is a highly political industry which is now a great danger to society. This is happening right through our financial system, and we need to turn the tide.”
SumUp, which says that it has 4 million business customers, charges a one-off cost for a card payment reader of between £39 and £139 and a transaction fee of 1.69 per cent.
Its restricted businesses also include airlines, political organisations, “get rich quick” merchants and pornography companies. They say that they will provide services for not-for-profit companies as long as their services are in “no way be used for raising funds in violation of financial sanction regime regulations, including but not limited to financing terrorism”.
When asked about the ban on hunts, a spokesman said: “SumUp operates under strict requirements imposed by the financial regulator, the card schemes, and our acquiring banks, who we rely on to operate our payment services.
“Therefore, we have guidelines from these external organisations on the types of business that we cannot support, which are clearly defined on our website. Our licence is not unlimited and we cannot support every business model. New restricted categories may be added depending on our partner’s policies.”
They said that they “cannot comment on the specific details of a merchant’s situation” because of GDPR and privacy rules.
However, the named card providers Visa, Mastercard and American Express have said that the restrictions have not been imposed by them as they do not restrict legal activities.
American Express is also listed by SumUp as one of their three “acquiring” banks which processes the transactions. A spokesman said the credit card company said it “does not make customer decisions on the basis of legally held personal or political views”.
A second acquiring bank, EVO Payments International GmbH, said it no longer worked with the company whilst the third, First Data Europe Limited which is now known as Fiserv, did not respond to requests for comment.
The Financial Conduct Authority has nothing in its Payment Services Regulations which dictates the type of business a payment service provider can work with.
Rishi Sunak has previously said that de-banking is “wrong” and that “no one should be barred from using basic services for their political views”.
Mr Smith, the Tory MP for Buckingham, added: “The Government was really strong on their reaction to politicians being de-banked, but that is clearly not where this story ends, this is not about Mr Farage.
“This now needs to be properly investigated as there are a lot of normal people out there who have been de-banked but don’t have their own television show to highlight what has happened to them.”
A HM Treasury spokesman said: “Freedom of speech is a cornerstone of our democracy, and it must be respected.
“That’s why we are changing the regulations so payment service providers must give a reason for closing an account or service, and extend the time needed to close an account to 90 days.
“This protects the rights of customers – providing real transparency, time to appeal and making it a much fairer playing field.”
