Flux creep is always present in the high-temperature superconductors. When it was found that the normalized creep rate S in YBa₂Cu₃O₇ is often equal to about 0.03, with little apparent dependence on field or temperature, inferences were drawn about the nature of the low-temperature vortex phase. We show that the experimental conditions are at least as important as the microscopic physics in determining the measured creep rate, and lead naturally to a minimum value of S which is close to 0.03. This conclusion has the corollary that the existence and magnitude of a 'universal' creep rate are not in themselves very informative about the underlying vortex dynamics.