Notice to Federal Agencies (March 2006)
In Re: VISA Check/MasterMoney Antitrust Litigation

Your agency may have received a Notice and Claim Form regarding the VISA Check/MasterMoney Antitrust Litigation. The notice states that you are entitled to a cash payment as a result of settlement of this litigation. The Department of Justice, with the assistance of the Department of the Treasury, has filed a consolidated claim in this settlement on behalf of all Federal agencies which participate in the Plastic Card Network. For this reason, your agency should not respond to this Notice.

The VISA Check/MasterMoney Antitrust Litigation was brought by a group of retailers against the VISA and MasterCard Associations. The retailers alleged that the Card Association rules which required merchants to accept VISA and MasterCard off-line (signature) debit card transactions violated the Federal antitrust laws. They argued that VISA and MasterCard used their dominance of the credit card market to force merchants to also accept their debit card products, with the ultimate result that retailers paid higher interchange fees. The case was brought as a class action, meaning that the retailers sued on behalf of everyone who accepted payments by VISA or MasterCard. Under Federal law, however, private counsel cannot represent Federal agencies and the issue of whether Federal agencies may be deemed class members and participate in the settlement is currently before the Court.

As a participant in the Treasury's Plastic Card Network, the interchange fees at issue in the litigation were paid for you by the Treasury. For this reason, any recovery in this litigation will not go to your agency's appropriations but instead will be deposited in the Treasury General Account as a miscellaneous receipt.

If for some reason you do receive a check from the Claims Administrator in this litigation, please forward it to Michael C. Salapka at the address below. Do not deposit any settlement checks into your own accounts. Doing so would constitute an illegal augmentation of your appropriation.

If you have additional questions regarding this matter, please contact:

Michael C. Salapka
Program Manager
U.S. Department of the Treasury
Financial Management Service
401 14th Street, S.W.
Room # 310 E
Washington, D.C. 20227
michael.salapka@fms.treas.gov
(202) 874-8919

If your agency's legal counsel has questions about this matter, he or she may contact:

Stephen T. Middlebrook
Senior Counsel
U.S. Department of the Treasury
Financial Management Service
stephen.middlebrook@fms.treas.gov
(202) 874-8422