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Visa, Mastercard fees class action lawsuits overview:
- Who: Visa and Mastercard are being targeted with a series of new antitrust class action lawsuits.
- Why: The antitrust class action lawsuits claim Visa and Mastercard charged European merchants illegal UK and European Union interchange fees for purchases made using commercial and interregional cards in the European Economic Area.
- Where: The proposed class action lawsuits were filed with the Competition Appeal Tribunal.
A series of new antitrust class action lawsuits have been filed against Visa and Mastercard on behalf of European merchants alleging they were charged illegal UK and European Union interchange fees.
The proposed class action lawsuits were filed with the Competition Appeal Tribunal and aim to receive reimbursement for European merchants who have been charged allegedly illegal interchange fees, Law360 reports.
The Visa and MasterCard fees were charged to the European merchants in response to them accepting payments from both commercial and interregional cards in and around the European Economic Area from as far back as 2016.
“We believe the case is strong. Competition authorities and courts in the EU and U.K. have found that (multilateral interchange fees) for accepting consumer credit and debit cards were unlawful,” Harcus Parker, the firm behind the new complaints, says in a statement.
Mastercard, Visa fees also charged using corporate, consumer cards across borders, lawsuit says
Harcus Parker said it also believes that businesses were “unlawfully charged for accepting corporate cards and consumer cards used across borders (inter-regionally).”
European merchants, meanwhile, claim that the interchange fees charged to them by Visa and Mastercard hinder competition by “artificially” raising prices that merchants have to pay to customer banks, Law360 reports.
A total of four individual and separate claims were made by the European merchants against Visa and Mastercard, including ones seeking compensation for smaller merchants and ones for “high-volume” merchants.
European merchants ask for damages with interest for the proposed class in addition for Visa and Mastercard to be ordered to cover all legal fees, Law360 reports.
Last year, a former financial ombudsman was the first in the UK to be granted certification for a £10 billion class action lawsuit that targeted Mastercard over claims it charged interchange fees which were unlawfully passed by retailers onto consumers.
Have you been charged Visa fees or MasterCard fees for using a commercial or interregional credit card? Let us know in the comments!
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