Tierrasanta's Pizza Standard leads a proposed class action against Visa, Mastercard and big banks over swipe fees

The Pizza Standard, a pizzeria on Clairemont Mesa Boulevard in Tierrasanta, is the named plaintiff in a proposed class-action antitrust lawsuit against Visa, Mastercard and several of the country's largest banks, SanDiegoVille reported Oct. 7. The suit was filed the week of Sept. 28 in federal court in the Eastern District of New York, according to the pizzeria's lawyers at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll.

The complaint alleges the card networks and banks — including entities tied to Bank of America, Capital One, JPMorgan Chase, Citibank and Wells Fargo — conspired to keep interchange and network fees, the so-called swipe fees merchants pay on each card sale, artificially high. It seeks to represent merchants who accepted cards after January 2019, the end of the period covered by an earlier multibillion-dollar settlement. The pizzeria has taken cards since 2021.

These are allegations in a newly filed lawsuit; a court has not ruled on them or certified the class. The reports did not include a response from the defendants.