May 2019 – The Hungarian Competition
Authority ("HCA") has published its
draft sector inquiry report on payment card acceptance in
Hungary.
The payment industry, in particular interchange fees, has long
been the subject of significant scrutiny and regulatory
intervention in Hungary. An interchange fee is a
fee that is typically paid by a merchant's bank (the acquiring
bank) to a customer's bank (issuing bank) for the acceptance of
card-based transactions. In practice, depending on the parties'
negotiating power, it may be incorporated into the service fee
charged by the acquiring bank to the merchant, and the price paid
by customers to the merchant.
Background
Following the footsteps of the European Commission, the
HCA took an active role in scrutinizing interchange
fees, launching anti-trust proceedings against
Hungarian banks and card schemes for setting national
interchange fees multilaterally and later against card schemes for
setting fees unilaterally.
