According to the Washington Post, independent ATM operators filed a lawsuit Wednesday accusing MasterCard and Visa of imposing contract terms that force them to charge consumers set fees.
The lawsuit claims that MasterCard and Visa force operators to charge consumers the same fee, regardless of whether their cards can access smaller networks that are less expensive for the ATM operators to use.
The ATM operators are seeking class-action status for their claims.
"It protects them from competition. Some people are not going to use an ATM because of the $2.50 fee. By discouraging those customers, [MasterCard and Visa] are holding down the volume of ATM transactions," said Jonathan Rubin of Rubin PLLC, the Washington, D.C. antitrust law firm that filed the lawsuit.
Rubin said his clients, which include several independent operators and the newly formed National ATM Council, represent about half the 400,000 ATMs in the U.S.
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