1288/5/7/18 Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd v Visa Europe Services LLC and Others

Remittal by the Court of Appeal.

On 4 July 2018 the Court of Appeal gave judgment ([2018] EWCA Civ 1536) in three appeals of the following judgments in the interchange fee cases: the judgment of the Tribunal in Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd v MasterCard Incorporated and Others ([2016] CAT 11) (see Case 1241/5/7/15 (T)) (the "Tribunal Proceedings"); and the judgments of the Commercial Court in Asda Stores Limited and Others v Mastercard Inc and Others ([2017] EWHC 93) (the "Asda Proceedings") and Sainsbury's Supermarkets Limited v Visa Europe Services LLC and Others ([2017] EWHC 3047 (Comm) and [2018] EWHC 355 (Comm)) (the "Visa Proceedings").  The Court of Appeal allowed the first ground of the Mastercard Defendants' appeal in the Tribunal Proceedings, as well as the retailers' appeals in the Asda Proceedings and the Visa Proceedings. Each of the appeals was remitted to the Tribunal for re-consideration in accordance with the Court of Appeal's judgment.

On 29 November 2018 the Supreme Court granted Mastercard and Visa permission to appeal the judgment of the Court of Appeal. The appeals were heard by the Supreme Court in January 2020. Judgment was given on 17 June 2020 ([2020] UKSC 24).

A joint case management conference with Cases 1286 and 1287 took place on 16 December 2020 where the Tribunal gave directions for the future conduct of the case.

On 23 March 2021 Sainsbury's sought direction from the Tribunal that Visa should not be able to pursue the asymmetric counterfactual raised by paragraph 27 of Visa's Defence. The Tribunal's judgment on the asymmetric counterfactual was issued on 28 June 2021 ([2021] CAT 17).  On 6 July 2021 Sainsbury's made an application for its costs and Visa sought permission to appeal the Tribunal's judgment.  The Tribunal issued its ruling in respect of these applications on 23 July 2021 ([2021] CAT 22).

A case management conference took place on 29 March 2021 where the Tribunal gave directions for disclosure.

A joint case management conference with Cases 1286 and 1287 listed for 31 March 2021 was vacated.

A case management conference took place on 9 July 2021 and a further case management conference has been listed for 25 November 2021, with a time estimate of 1½ days.

The trial of the quantum issue has been listed for 20 June 2022, with a time estimate of 3 weeks.