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A San Diego pizzeria has filed a proposed class action accusing Visa, Mastercard and five major banks of keeping merchant credit card fees artificially high. The complaint seeks to cover merchants that accepted the networks’ cards from Jan. 25, 2019, onward; the allegations have not been proven in court.
A San Diego pizzeria has filed a proposed class action accusing Visa, Mastercard and five major banks of conspiring to keep merchant credit card fees artificially high, including after a prior settlement that covered earlier transactions. The claims are allegations in a 134-page complaint and have not been established in court.
The lawsuit names Bank of America, Capital One, Chase Bank, Citibank and Wells Fargo alongside the two payment networks. It alleges the defendants coordinated schedules of interchange fees, which merchants pay to banks that issue credit cards for each transaction. According to the complaint, network rules require merchants accepting one Visa or Mastercard credit card to accept all cards bearing that brand, regardless of the fees attached.
The complaint says those rules, together with restrictions on steering customers to cheaper payment methods or surcharging for particular cards, weaken merchants’ ability to respond to costs. It also alleges Visa and Mastercard impose their own network fees on merchants. The filing says merchants now pay more than $100 billion annually to accept Visa and Mastercard credit cards; that figure is presented as the plaintiffs’ claim, not an independently verified finding.
The proposed class would include individuals, businesses and other entities in the United States that accepted Visa- or Mastercard-branded credit cards from Jan. 25, 2019 until the alleged anticompetitive effects end. The case follows earlier litigation: a court approved a monetary settlement in December 2019 covering a class period that ended Jan. 24, 2019. The new complaint argues that settlement did not compensate merchants for fees paid after that date.
Why Merchants Seek Post-2019 Relief
If the claims succeed, the case could affect how card networks and banks set transaction charges and how much flexibility merchants have when choosing which payment methods to accept. Credit card fees are a recurring cost for businesses, and merchants may account for those costs in prices or other business decisions. The complaint argues that rules limiting acceptance choices and customer steering reduce competitive pressure on fees.
The lawsuit also targets a period the plaintiffs say was left outside the earlier monetary settlement. That makes the requested relief relevant to businesses that accepted the cards after January 2019. At this stage, however, no court finding has established that the defendants conspired or that the fees were anticompetitive; the filing states the plaintiffs’ position.
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Earlier Settlement Ended in January 2019
The complaint points to a long-running multidistrict case over Visa and Mastercard merchant fees. A court approved a monetary settlement in December 2019, with compensation tied to transactions during a class period ending Jan. 24, 2019, according to the report. The new suit focuses on alleged conduct and merchant fees from the following day onward.
A separate settlement seeking changes to rules has been preliminarily approved, the complaint says. The plaintiffs contend that any prospective rule changes would not compensate merchants for past fees after January 2019. The source report does not describe the terms of that proposed injunctive relief in detail, so its exact effect on merchant choices cannot be determined from the available information.
“A “deadweight toll on virtually every credit card purchase in America.””
— The complaint
credit card processing fee terminal
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Claims Await Court Review
The available report does not give the complaint’s filing date, the court or case number, or any response from Visa, Mastercard or the named banks. It also does not establish whether a judge has ruled on certification of the proposed class or on the merits. The defendants’ positions are not included in the source material.
The alleged coordination, the effect of the challenged rules, the claimed annual fee total and the plaintiffs’ proposed class scope remain subject to legal and factual scrutiny. The complaint itself does not prove that the defendants violated the law, and the eventual class boundaries or remedies could differ from what the plaintiffs seek.
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Court Proceedings Will Set the Scope
The case must proceed through court before the allegations can result in a judgment or settlement. Further filings may include responses from the defendants and requests about how the lawsuit should proceed, including whether it can move forward on behalf of the proposed class. The source report does not identify a hearing date or other scheduled milestone.
Any decision on class certification, the alleged conduct or potential relief would clarify which merchants could be included and what claims may be considered. Until then, the allegations and the proposed class description remain the pizzeria’s claims rather than findings by the court.
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Key Questions
Who is being sued?
The proposed class action names Visa, Mastercard, Bank of America, Capital One, Chase Bank, Citibank and Wells Fargo.
What does the lawsuit allege?
The pizzeria alleges the networks and banks used coordinated fee schedules and rules that limited merchants’ ability to reject higher-cost cards or steer customers to cheaper payment options. These claims have not been proven.
Which merchants could be covered?
The complaint proposes a class of U.S. individuals, businesses and other entities that accepted Visa- or Mastercard-branded credit cards from Jan. 25, 2019 until the alleged effects end. A court has not necessarily approved that class.
How does the case relate to the earlier settlement?
The complaint says a monetary settlement approved in December 2019 covered a class period ending Jan. 24, 2019, and did not compensate merchants for fees paid after that date. A separate settlement seeking prospective rule changes has been preliminarily approved, according to the complaint.
Have the allegations been confirmed?
No. They are allegations in a proposed class action. The source report does not include a court ruling on the merits or responses from the named defendants.
Source: hn
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