{"id":546,"date":"2026-09-01T12:13:40","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T16:13:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/?p=546"},"modified":"2026-09-01T12:13:41","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T16:13:41","slug":"anti-tying-restrictions-navigating-the-combined-balance-discount-exception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/2026\/09\/01\/anti-tying-restrictions-navigating-the-combined-balance-discount-exception\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-Tying Restrictions: Navigating the Combined-Balance Discount Exception"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The anti-tying provisions of 12 U.S.C. \u00a7 1972 are among the most significant restrictions governing how banks market and price their products. Generally, a bank may not condition the availability or pricing of one product on a customer&#8217;s purchase of another product. However, the combined-balance discount exception provides meaningful flexibility for banks seeking to reward full-relationship customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Safe Harbor for Combined Balances<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Under <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ecfr.gov\/current\/title-12\/chapter-II\/subchapter-A\/part-225\/subpart-A\/section-225.7\">12 CFR 225.7(b)(2)<\/a>, a bank <em>may <\/em>condition product availability or pricing on a customer obtaining a &#8220;loan, discount, deposit, or trust service.&#8221; The Federal Reserve has identified 20 categories of qualifying services, including but not limited to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>All types of extensions of credit, letters of credit, and financial guarantees<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>All forms of deposit accounts, safe deposit box services, and escrow services<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Cash management, payroll, and payment\/settlement services<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Fiduciary, custody, and transfer agent services<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Credit card and merchant processing services<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Remote\/mobile deposit capture and deposit sweep services<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Expanded Definition of &#8220;Customer&#8221;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For combined-balance discount purposes, &#8220;customer&#8221; may include not only the natural person but also any members of that person&#8217;s &#8220;immediate family&#8221; (as defined in 12 CFR 225.41(b)(3)) who reside at the same address. This allows household-level product bundling. Additionally, financial products including insurance products may count toward the combined balance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This exception offers banks significant latitude to design relationship-based pricing programs, but careful documentation is essential to demonstrate compliance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>DM Tip<\/strong>: Review your product bundling and discount programs to ensure they fall within the safe harbor. Document which products count toward combined balances and maintain records showing that household-level aggregation is limited to immediate family members residing at the same address.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The anti-tying provisions of 12 U.S.C. \u00a7 1972 are among the most significant restrictions governing how banks market and price their products. Generally, a bank may not condition the availability or pricing of one product on a customer&#8217;s purchase of another product. However, the combined-balance discount exception provides meaningful flexibility for banks seeking to reward &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/2026\/09\/01\/anti-tying-restrictions-navigating-the-combined-balance-discount-exception\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Anti-Tying Restrictions: Navigating the Combined-Balance Discount Exception&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":693,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[502],"class_list":["post-546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"authors":[{"term_id":502,"user_id":693,"is_guest":0,"slug":"jsilvia","display_name":"Joseph E. Silvia","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/14\/2024\/09\/silviajoseph-100x100.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Silvia","first_name":"Joseph E.","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/josephsilvia.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/josephsilvia.html\">Read Joseph's bio.<\/a>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/693"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=546"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":548,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546\/revisions\/548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=546"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}