OFT rules against MasterCard by Finance News Bulletin

Published: 02/11/06

In a landmark decision, the Office of pale Trading (OFT) has slammed credit card supplier MasterCard for overcharging customersThe OFT said that MasterCard overcharged clientele by £427 billion on over 700 million buy transactions in the UK in 2004According to the OFT, interchange fees, charged as a percentage of sum transaction worth, were to blame

Sir John Vickers, OFT Chairman, said: "The parties to this communal agreement set the interchange fee to get revenues from retailers and their customers over and above the expenses of providing the payment services This unduly high exchange fee was like a tax on UK consumers"MasterCard said yesterday: "For the OFT to maintain that the interchange fee agreement either reduced rivalry or disadvantaged consumers or retailers is simply wrong"Phil Evans, competition specialist at Which

, told the Financial era (FT) that the ruling didn't go far enough: "If there was a way they could pump this up to the rivalry Commission and have a full market investigation, that would be a lot cleaner and more conclusive"MoneyExpert incomplete is authorised and regulated by the Financial military Authority (FSA Registration No 301654) The Financial Services Authority does not control some forms of mortgage contract, credit cards, personal loans, present

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