Supreme Court throws out ruling that upheld NY credit card law

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday threw out a ruling that upheld a New York law barring retailers from charging more to buy with credit, sending the case back to a lower court to decide as a free speech issue not as pricing regulation.

The merchants that challenged the law argued it violated their free speech rights under the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment, and the 8-0 ruling by the justices handed them at least a temporary victory. The justices returned the matter to the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld the law in 2015 as legitimate pricing regulation.

Retailers are forced to pay fees to credit card companies every time a customer buys with a card. The New York law barred retailers from imposing a surcharge on customers who made purchases with a credit card. It also made it impossible for merchants to call fees paid to credit card companies a surcharge that is added to the price of a product. The law did not stop retailers from offering a discount for cash purchases.

The case hinged on whether the justices saw the law as a speech restriction or a traditional form of price regulation that is not subject to a free speech challenge. Although the court, in a ruling authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, ruled that it is a speech regulation, it did not decide whether or not the measure is lawful.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-creditcards-idUSKBN17020G

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U.S. | Wed Mar 29, 2017 | 10:44am EDT
By Lawrence Hurley | WASHINGTON

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Wow

Thought these issues were settled a long time ago

[FiveGoodMen]

5. Nothing is ever settled.

Anything can be undone.

Trump has shown that with a vengeance.

Assuming that once the court decides in favor of the public and of fairness that the matter is settled is a grave error.

The left has made this error repeatedly throughout my 57-year lifetime.

You have to keep winning the hearts and minds of each generation or they will tear up all the progress of the past.

[groundloop]

2. Credit card surcharge is a freedom of speech issue..... WTF ???????

Oh wait, I remember now.... money is speech.

[onenote]

8. Pretty clear you didn't read the opinion. nt

[cstanleytech]

10. In a way yes but that doesnt mean the lower court cannot still issue a similar ruling for different

reasons which might be why SCOTUS sent it back down to them.

[Princess Turandot]

3. Unanimous decision...

Held:

1. This Court’s review is limited to whether §518 is unconstitutional as applied to the particular pricing scheme that, before this Court, petitioners have argued they seek to employ: a single-sticker regime, in which merchants post a cash price and an additional credit card surcharge. Pp. 5–6.
.............

3. Section 518 regulates speech. The Court of Appeals concluded that §518 posed no First Amendment problem because price controls regulate conduct, not speech. Section 518, however, is not like a typical price regulation, which simply regulates the amount a store can collect. The law tells merchants nothing about the amount they are allowed to collect from a cash or credit card payer. Instead, it regulates how sellers may communicate their prices. In regulating the communication of prices rather than prices themselves, §518 regulates speech.

Because the Court of Appeals concluded otherwise, it did not determine whether §518 survives First Amendment scrutiny. On remand the Court of Appeals should analyze §518 as a speech regulation. Pp. 8–10

ROBERTS, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which KENNEDY, THOMAS, GINSBURG, and KAGAN, JJ., joined. BREYER, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment. SOTOMAYOR, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which ALITO, J., joined.

The opinion is here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-1391_g31i.pdf

[elleng]

7. 'how sellers may communicate their prices. In regulating the communication of prices

rather than prices themselves, §518 regulates speech.'

[Historic NY]

4. Dear merchant don't advertise you take credit cards then if your going to charge a self-imposed

surcharge. Your agreement is with the Credit Card company and their fee structure. Please let us know in advance so we can go elsewhere.

[thesquanderer]

6. It's semantics.

Gas stations around here have different prices for paying with cash vs. credit card. Is it a surcharge for credit card use? Or a discount for cash use? In the end, that's only a semantic argument. I think the real issue is that pricing be communicated clearly (as it is at the gas stations). It would not be appropriate to be "surprised" with an additional fee when you go to pay.

[onenote]

9. The law doesn't tell merchants what they can charge. It limits how they can describe their charges

A merchant can, and quite rationally might want to, charge cash customers less than credit card customers since there are costs associated with credit card transactions that are not applicable to cash transactions. The law doesn't bar a merchant from charging $10.00 to credit card customers and $9.70 to cash customers. But it seemingly makes it illegal to describe the price for credit card customers as including a $0.30 surcharge while not prohibiting the store from describing the $9.70 price as including a "discount." Because how the law works is muddled, merchants who might prefer one approach over the other in describing the pricing -- which is utterly unaffected by the descriptions -- can't do so.

Because the court of appeals viewed the case as involving conduct -- as regulating what the merchant can charge -- it didn't reach a speech question. But as shown, the law doesn't regulate what the merchant charges, just how they describe those charges. As a result, the Court sent the case back to the appeals court to consider whether there was a rational basis for drawing distinctions between the same pricing schemes based on how they are described (discount v. surcharge).

Not surprising that it was a unanimous decision in that regard.

[progree]

11. I wish you had written the article instead of Lawrence Hurley (Reuters)

Because the Reuters article is extremely very misleading at best.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday threw out a ruling that upheld a New York law barring retailers from charging more to customers buying with credit cards... ((sorry, that's simply not true))

((blah blah for 2 more paragraphs))

... The New York law barred retailers from imposing a surcharge on customers who made purchases with a credit card. It also made it impossible for merchants to call fees paid to credit card companies a surcharge that is added to the price of a product. The law did not stop retailers from offering a discount for cash purchases.

Ohhhhhhhh.... only in the last sentence of the 4th paragraph (above) might one suspect something isn't quite right with the preceding narrative. Repeating:

"The law did not stop retailers from offering a discount for cash purchases."

The rest of the article is not helpful either, IMHO.

[KWR65]

12. When a person pays cash they are alsoing paying the 2-3% debt and/or credit card tax N?T

IMHO if you want to use a debit/credit card you should directly pay the 2-3% transaction fee. This would help reduce people from charging up their cards and reduce prices by having the users of cards pay the fees instead of all of the store customers.