🧑‍⚖️ China–Electronic Payments (P)

China – Certain Measures Affecting Electronic Payments WT/DS285/R, WT/DS413/R (Report of the Panel), <www.wto.org>

7.183 The Panel observes that the manner in which the supply of integrated services such as the services at issue is organized depends on a number of parameters, including the business models adopted by specific companies, the regulatory framework in the country concerned, and how the direct users of payment services (e.g. issuing and acquiring institutions) organize their supply in specific jurisdictions. Some companies may provide the various components of the services at issue, thus supplying a final product as a "package" for the direct users and for the ultimate beneficiaries of these services (i.e. the card holder, the issuer, the acquirer and the merchant). There may, however, be other circumstances where the different components are supplied by different suppliers. The evidence submitted by China indicates, for instance, that, in the case of France, the authorization process, on the one hand, and clearing and settlement, on the other hand, are provided by two different entities.

[at 55] 7.184 Thus, the evidence before us suggests that, in practice, the services essential to a payment card transaction to be completed may be supplied by one or more service supplier(s). As we have said, while some suppliers provide all the various components of that service in an integrated manner, other suppliers may specialize in one segment of that service. In our view, the fact that some component services may be supplied by different suppliers is not a sufficient basis for classifying each or some of these services under different subsectors. Indeed, as noted by the United States, "[i]t is the combination that enables the payment card transaction to occur". Hence, the mere fact that separate suppliers provide one particular component of a service does not in itself imply that that component should be classified as a distinct service, or that the component is not part of an integrated service. In our view, what is relevant in relation to an integrated service is not whether it is supplied by a single supplier or by several suppliers, but rather whether the component services, when combined together, result in a new and distinct service, the integrated service.

at [55–56]