THE giant VISA International credit card operation has exceeded its goodwill limit with the European Commission over its proposal to prevent member banks from offering competing credit cards, a policy which VISA has enforced in the United States since the late 1980s.

The EU said this week that it was ending its investigation as VISA had intimated that it was scrapping the proposal. Now the battle ground looks like shifting to the United States. VISA's competitors have been given fresh ammunition to pursue the case that what is illegal in Europe should also be banned on the other side of the Atlantic. "We're going to complain everywhere", a spokesman for Amex said. With competing payment card companies flexing their muscles a no holds barred battle between the inflexible giants of plastic may well be imminent.