Europese Commissie start onderzoek naar werkwijze van creditcard-maatschappij VISA (en)

The Commission's "Statement of Objections" -- the formal document setting forth the preliminary findings of the Commission probe into the VISA association membership rules -- concerns a rule in the Visa International bylaws. According to that rule, the Visa International Board shall not accept for membership any applicant deemed by the Board to be a competitor of Visa. The Commission is concerned that this Visa membership rule is not applied in an objective and non-discriminatory manner vis-à-vis all applicants for Visa membership. This rule could preclude potential entrants from providing credit card services to merchants. In this area Visa has a strong market position throughout the EEA.

The Commission's statement concerns the activity of banks offering credit card services to shops and merchants in the European Union. This economically significant payment card market segment, divided along national lines, represents the least competitive part of the credit card market across the EEA Member States. Merchants' choice of an acquirer is restricted, sometimes to the extent that there is one monopolist acquirer.

According to the Commission's preliminary assessment, the above-mentioned VISA rule implies that potential entrants would not be able to operate on the Visa network anywhere in the EEA. This would mean a foregone opportunity for more competition in the merchant acquiring markets across the EEA, which could be realised through a potentially powerful new entrant with a pan-European card business strategy.

In addition, being refused Visa membership prevents potential new entrants from engaging in cross-border acquiring, a newly evolving segment of the acquiring business which has the potential of increasing competition in the national markets by making domestic service providers compete with acquirers based in other EEA Member States.

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter ("MSDW") operates the Discover brand credit card and VISA deemed it to be a competitor. In April 2000 MSDW filed a complaint with the Commission requesting the latter to prevent Visa from applying its membership rules in a way as to exclude MSDW from Visa membership.

While MSDW -- as the owner of the Discover network -- was refused Visa membership, the owners of several other payment card schemes have been admitted as Visa members.

This is true for, e.g., Citigroup as the owner of the Diners Club network and several Japanese banks which are the main shareholders of the JCB Co Ltd and Cetelem as the operator of the Aurora payment card network. Visa has failed to explain why a global network such as Diners Club, which operates in over 200 countries, including Europe, should be less of a threat to Visa than a regional network like Discover, which operates only in the US and does not have any presence in Europe.

Finally, MasterCard which in principle should be very comparable to Visa in its concern about the protection of confidential information, does not have any rule which would be similar to the Visa's rule in question, and MSDW has been admitted as a MasterCard member.

VISA is now given the opportunity to address the Commission's concerns within a three-month deadline and can also set out its point of view in an oral hearing.