Do Gift Cards Keep on Giving How the Law Affects the Consumer, the Retailer and the State
As the Kansas City Chiefs were winning the big game, New York made a big change to its law governing credit card surcharges. While definitions of the term may vary, a "surcharge" is generally understood to mean a higher...more
On February 11, 2024, a new law went into effect in New York, establishing important limits and rules for surcharging. Enacted in December 2023, the new statute has a price disclosure component, detailing how surcharge prices...more
The U.S. District Court, District of Kansas recently ruled in CardX, LLC v. Schmidt, that Kansas Statute Annotated § 16a-2-403, which prohibits merchants from imposing a surcharge on customers who elect to pay via credit...more
On February 25, 2021, the United States District Court for the District of Kansas issued an opinion granting summary judgment in favor of CardX, LLC (CardX), and found unconstitutional “a Kansas law that prohibits sellers...more
The beginning of 2019 brought updates in the world of payment cards, with what appears to be an end to the long-running litigation over credit card surcharges in the state of New York....more
The NY Attorney General and the plaintiffs in Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman have filed a joint motion with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit asking the court to vacate the district court’s final...more
In the latest piece of the surcharge controversy, New York’s highest court interpreted state law to hold that a merchant complies with the statute so long as it posts the total dollars and cents price charged to credit card...more
As we reported on in 2013, 2015, and 2016, there has been much legal confusion as to how New York merchants can pass on the credit-card “swipe fees” to their customers. In the case of Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman,...more
The New York Court of Appeals has issued an opinion in Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman interpreting the state’s law that prohibits merchants from imposing a surcharge on credit card purchases (Section 518 of the...more
Deceptive Trade Practices - Meat Exporter Had No Duty Under FCA to Pay for Beef Inspection - In United States ex rel. Barrick v. Parker-Migliorini Int'l, LLC, 878 F. 3d 1224 (10th Cir. 2017), the court affirmed...more
The Ninth Circuit’s recent decision in Italian Colors Rest. v. Becerra (“Italian Colors”), upheld an as-applied constitutional challenge to a California law prohibiting retailers from imposing a surcharge on customers paying...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Ninth Circuit upholds district court decision granting five businesses injunctive relief, finding that state law banning credit card surcharges is unconstitutional as applied to the five businesses. ...more
A California law that prohibits merchants from imposing a surcharge on credit card purchases violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, a unanimous panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has...more
The New York Court of Appeals will consider the state’s law prohibiting merchants from imposing credit card surcharges, following certification of that question by the Second Circuit, on remand from the U.S. Supreme Court....more
State laws that prohibit retailers from charging customers a surcharge for using a credit card are being challenged on First Amendment grounds. For more than four decades, California’s Song-Beverly Credit Card Act of 1971...more
EDITOR’S NOTE - Summer blockbuster season is officially upon us. Have you seen Wonder Woman yet? What about Guardians of the Galaxy Part 2? It’s déjà vu all over again with Baywatch, Pirates of the Caribbean, Alien,...more
The Supreme Court of the United States recently heard an oral argument concerning New York's surcharge law, addressing whether the statute—which prohibits the imposition of surcharges on customers who pay with credit cards...more
On March 29, 2017, in a unanimous ruling, the US Supreme Court ruled that a New York statute, which prohibits identifying a surcharge to customers for credit card payments, regulates speech and is therefore subject to...more
Last week, in a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court of the United States held that New York General Business Law Section 518, which provides that "[n]o seller in any sales transaction may impose a surcharge on a holder who...more
The Supreme Court in Expressions Hair Design et al. v. Schneiderman held that New York’s law prohibiting credit card surcharging (General Business Law §5 18) regulates speech, and on Wednesday asked the Second Circuit to...more
For nearly four years we have been tracking the ongoing legal battle over a merchant’s right in New York to charge a surcharge to customers who use a credit card as a method of payment. This saga came to a head on March 29,...more
On March 29, 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a New York statute restricting credit card surcharges regulated commercial speech. Yet, Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman (No. 15-1391) did not decide whether such...more
The U.S. Supreme Court held last week that New York’s ban on credit card surcharging is a restraint on speech under the First Amendment. Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman, No. 15-1391 (U.S. Mar. 29, 2017). The case was...more
A New York case decided this week by the U.S. Supreme Court involving a state prohibition on credit card surcharge fees would not, at first blush, seem to involve “speech,” let alone “speech” that needs to be protected by the...more
In a unanimous decision, the U.S. Supreme Court recently held that retailers engage in protected speech when they communicate their prices to customers. Specifically, the Court addressed communication regarding differential...more