Visa Inc., MasterCard Incorporated, and a group of credit cardissuing banks agreed on July 13 to pay an estimated $7.25 billion to settle claims that their credit card swipe-fee practices are anticompetitive. A trio of firms representing the nationwide class of merchantsRobins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi, Berger & Montague, and Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowdsay the proposed deal includes reforms that will benefit retailers, such as a temporary reduction in interchange fees and possible new "checkout" surcharges on customers.
The accord, on behalf of a class of about 7 million merchants, comes after a seven-year legal battle and two months ahead of a scheduled trial. In their complaint, originally filed beginning in 2005 and later consolidated as a multidistrict litigation in federal district court in Brooklyn, New York, merchants claimed that the credit card companies and issuing banksincluding Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corporation, and four otherscolluded to fix prices on the interchange or "swipe" fees charged to retailers every time a consumer makes a purchase.
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