Last month, the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal (“CAT”) announced its long-awaited class certification judgment in Merricks v. MasterCard – the largest damages claim in UK history and the second case brought under the new collective proceedings system. Under the UK Consumer Rights Act 2015, private plaintiffs may bring collective proceedings similar to class actions available in the U.S., Canada and other countries. The CAT's analysis and observations may deter some actions and encourage others as a major step in developing case law to guide courts and litigants in the future.

Procedural Background

The Merricks case arose from an EU Commission action against MasterCard, which determined that MasterCard had imposed supra-competitive multilateral interchange fees on retailers for cross-border transactions. A number of private damages lawsuits brought by retailers followed, and MasterCard has paid these retailers hundreds of millions of dollars in damages and settlements. (For example, the decision in Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd. v. MasterCard, Inc. [2016] CAT 11, which awarded Sainsbury £68.6 million, plus interest.)