LONDON, March 16 (Reuters) – Visa and Mastercard can challenge a judgment that found their default multilateral interchange fees charged to retailers infringe competition law, London’s Court of Appeal ruled on Tuesday, in a long-running legal battle over the charges.
The Competition Appeal Tribunal ruled last year, in linked lawsuits brought by hundreds of merchants, that Visa and Mastercard’s multilateral interchange fees breached European competition law.
The merchants’ lawyers previously said that was the first time Visa and Mastercard’s commercial card and inter-regional multilateral interchange fees had been found to infringe competition law.
But the Court of Appeal granted permission to appeal on Tuesday, in a decision welcomed by Mastercard and Visa.
The companies said in separate statements that interchange plays an important role in a digital payments ecosystem and provides benefits to consumers, businesses and banks.
Cian Mansfield, from law firm Scott+Scott, which represents the claimants, said: “We are confident that we will resist the application successfully at the substantive appeal”.
(Reporting by Sam Tobin; Editing by Alexander Smith)
Comments