Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc.'s settlement of a merchants' lawsuit over credit card fees, a deal that may cost the companies and banks as much as $7.25 billion, was submitted for approval to a federal judge, Bloomberg News reported on Friday. Plaintiffs lawyers formally asked U.S. District Judge John Gleeson to sign off on the agreement covering about 7 million retailers. The settlement would resolve seven years of litigation over allegations that Foster City, Calif.-based Visa and Purchase, New York-based MasterCard conspired with major banks to fix the fees merchants pay when customers use a credit card. A hearing on preliminary approval of the settlement is expected to be held in December or early next year, according to attorneys involved in the case. Final approval of the deal may take a year, said Robert Stolebarger, a lawyer for the Electronic Payments Coalition, a credit- and debit-card industry group that has advised the defendants.
