The New York Court of Appeals has issued an opinion in Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman interpreting the state’s law that prohibits merchants from imposing a surcharge on credit card purchases (Section 518 of the state’s General Business Law). The court concluded that if a merchant posts its prices and charges lower prices to cash customers, it must post the price charged to credit card customers. As a result, the court also concluded that the law prohibits a merchant from using a “single-sticker-price” scheme in which a merchant posts a single cash price for its goods and services but indicates an additional amount is added for credit card customers.

The opinion was issued in answer to the following question certified to the NY court by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit: “Does a merchant comply with [Section 518] so long as the merchant posts the total dollars-and-cents price charged to credit-card users?” The Second Circuit certified the question following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year in Expressions Hair Design and remand of the case to the Second Circuit. The Supreme Court ruled that Section 518 regulates speech, thereby making it subject to First Amendment scrutiny. The Second Circuit had initially concluded that Section 518 did not violate the First Amendment because it only regulates only pricing, not speech. The Supreme Court vacated that decision and because the Second Circuit had not considered whether, as a speech regulation, Section 518 survived First Amendment scrutiny, remanded for the Second Circuit to do so.

The parties in Expressions Hair Design agreed that Section 518 does not prohibit differential pricing in which a merchant charges more to customers who pay by credit card. However, the plaintiffs, five merchants and their owners, sought to use a “single-sticker-price” scheme in which a merchant posts a single cash price for its goods and services but indicates an additional amount is added for credit card customers rather than a “dual-price” scheme in which a merchant posts two different prices—one for credit card customers and one for cash customers. The plaintiffs alleged that by prohibiting their use of a “single-sticker-price” scheme or restricting how they describe the price differential in a “dual-price” scheme, Section 518 violates the First Amendment because it regulates how they communicate their prices. The NY Court of Appeals concluded that although Section 518 does not allow use of a “single-sticker-price” scheme, it does not prohibit a merchant from using the word “surcharge” or any other words to communicate to customers that the credit card price is higher than the cash price.

The Second Circuit will now need to determine whether Section 518, as interpreted by the NY Court of Appeals, is a valid restriction on commercial speech under Supreme Court precedent. Such precedent is discussed in the Second Circuit’s opinion certifying the Section 518 question to the NY court. The Second Circuit suggested that if Section 518 were to be understood to compel the disclosure of an item’s credit card price alongside its cash price, it might properly be analyzed under Supreme Court precedent that applies a lenient standard of review to laws that require commercial entities to make certain disclosures to prevent consumer deception or confusion.