EU Commission steps further into litigation against Visa Europe
- The European Commission's DG "Competition" has issued on Monday, 6th April 2009 a statement of objections against Visa Europe's interbank Multilateral Interchange Fees (MIFs). On 11 March 2009, Visa Europe adopted a new methodology for setting cross-border interbank fees, cutting the average debit card fee from 0.28 &;8364; to 0.18 &;8364; and the average credit card fee from 0.7 % to 0.61 %. It accepted to base the methodology on the Commission's preferred approach to have the merchant pay for the benefits of not handling cash.
- But, although the EC says the changes are a "step in the right direction", they "do not remove its concern that Visa's MIFs restrict competition [...]. Visa's MIFs harm competition between acquiring banks, inflate the cost of payment card acceptance for merchants and ultimately increase consumer prices," says the official statement.