Mastercard class appeal goes to Supreme Court

In July 2019, the UK’s highest court granted Masterard permission to appeal the Court of Appeal judgment ordering the Competition Appeal Tribunal to re-examine Merricks’s bid for class certification.

Given that a class action claim is yet to be certified since the mechanism took effect in 2015, the case is bound to be followed closely by the legal community. The case relates to disputes between Mastercard and some of the U.K.'s biggest retailers and their customers over interchange fees, bank-to-bank charges imposed whenever shoppers pay using credit cards.

In a feature for GCR on this Supreme Court appeal, Luke Streatfeild, Counsel, was asked for comment and remarked: “It is not surprising that the test for certification of collective proceedings has caught the attention of the Supreme Court.  The collective recovery of losses caused by anti-competitive activity is a matter of great significance to consumers and businesses alike, and we look forward to further judicial guidance on the point before long.”  

Wessen Jazrawi, Partner specialising in antitrust issues, shared her views with Law360 on the decision and the issues to watch in the class action appeal. “The Court of Appeal found it is not supposed to be a mini trial. There has to be a real prospect of success but the Court’s view was that claimants should not be prevented from proceeding to trial because they don’t have the hard data available at the certification stage.”

Full article Global Competition Review (reproduced with permission of GCR). 
Full article Law 360 (subscription only).

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