In dispute for nearly 13 years with the Competition Authority, 10 French banks have just obtained a final legal victory. At the end, the cancellation of a fine of 385 million euros in total.
The 3rd cassation appeal was the right one. After a 13-year legal marathon, 10 French retail banks (1) finally obtained the definitive cancellation of a global fine of nearly 385 million euros imposed in September 2010 by the Competition Authority, announced The echoes.
A victory with a bitter taste: The decision puts an end to the litigation, but the damage caused by this unfounded decision of the Competition Authority remains, thus declared Daniel Baal, the general manager of Crdit Mutuel Alliance Fdrale, for whom the image of banks has been tarnished.
A commission of 4.3 euro cents per check
The stakes of this interminable legal battle seem from another time. We must, in fact, go back to 2002 to find its origin. At the time, the ten or so banks concerned invented a so-called check image exchange commission (CEIC)intended to compensate for a financial imbalance created by the digitization of check processing.
Brought to release the sums paid by check earlier, the banks argued that they could no longer invest them for as long as before, which led to a loss of financial income. As a result, the 11 banks concerned had uniformly applied 80% of the volumes traded to a commission of 4.3 euro cents per checkexplained to AFP at the time.
Introduced in early 2002, this CEIC was finally abolished in July 2007, under pressure from the Competition Authority. This had not deterred the latter from fining the banks. The institution reproached them, in particular, for having passed on the cost of this commission to the fees billed to their customers, even though the automation of the processing of checks, formerly carried out manually, had enabled them to make significant savings.
(1) Crdit Agricole, Socit Gnrale, BNP Paribas, Crdit Mutuel, CIC, Crdit du Nord, LCL, La Banque Postale, BPCE and HSBC