(Adds details, background)
BRUSSELS, June 16 (Reuters) - Payment card company Visa Europe has been given an extended, end-July deadline to respond to EU charges of limiting competition between banks with its transaction fees, the European Commission said on Tuesday.
"The Commission's hearing officer thought that the reasons Visa Europe gave justified an extension," Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd said, adding the original deadline had been this month.
In April, the 27-country European Union's executive arm accused Visa of setting fees for cross-border transactions that inflated the cost of payment card acceptance for merchants, ultimately increasing consumer prices.
Visa had said the charges were related to its previous method of setting MIFs -- cross-border multilateral interchange fees -- and not new methods under which it had lowered its cross-border credit and debit transaction fees.
European retail body Eurocommerce filed on Monday a complaint with the Commission, saying Visa's interchange fee procedure was unfair.
Visa's credit and debit cards account for about a third of all payment cards issued in the European economic area, according to the Commission. (Reporting by Foo Yun Chee)