Nintendo Tells Court It Owes No Tariff Refunds to Switch, Switch 2 Buyers
Nintendo has formally asked a Washington federal court to throw out a class action lawsuit that accuses the company of pocketing tariff refunds while refusing to pass any savings back to customers who paid tariff-inflated prices for Switch and Switch 2 hardware. In a motion filed Monday, Nintendo’s lawyers argued that buyers “received exactly what they bargained and paid for” and that the money customers handed over “represents the purchase price of the goods they wanted and received,” according to court filings reported by Game File in the case of Hoffert et al v. Nintendo.
The filing is Nintendo’s first detailed legal defence since gamers sued the company in April, and it sets up a fight over whether consumers can claim a share of tariff money that Nintendo itself is now trying to recover from the U.S. government.
Hoffert v. Nintendo Targets Switch Lite, OLED and Switch 2 Accessory Price Hikes
The underlying case, filed in Washington state, was brought by consumers on behalf of consumers who purchased Nintendo products between February 1, 2025 and February 24, 2026. Court reporting identifies the named plaintiffs as Gregory Hoffert and Prashant Sharan.
Gizmodo’s review of the case notes that last August Nintendo spiked costs on all its original Switch variants, including the Switch Lite and Switch OLED, by $30 to $50, and also hiked prices for several Switch 2 accessories, like the Joy-Con 2 and Switch 2 Pro Controller. Plaintiffs argue that if Nintendo later recovers those tariff costs from Washington, it would effectively be paid twice — once by customers at the till, and again by the U.S. Treasury.
GoNintendo’s coverage of the original complaint quotes the plaintiffs’ warning that “unless restrained by this Court, Nintendo stands to recover the same tariff payments twice—once from consumers through higher prices and again from the federal government through tariff refunds, including interest paid by the government on those funds.”
Nintendo’s Lawyers: “That Is Not How Commercial Transactions Work”
In its motion to dismiss, Nintendo rejected the idea that a later, favourable legal outcome on tariffs creates any retroactive obligation to past customers. Game File reports the company’s attorneys wrote that “the common thread among Plaintiffs’ claims is that it is somehow ‘unfair’ that Nintendo has not retroactively adjusted its prices for completed sales in response to the outcome of the tariff litigation,” adding, “But that is not how commercial transactions work.”
The filing goes further, framing each purchase as a closed transaction rather than an ongoing obligation. As GameDeveloper’s report on the filing lays out, Nintendo’s lawyers wrote that “Nintendo or one of its retailers set a price for each product, and consumers decided whether that price was worth paying. Those who bought Nintendo’s products received exactly what they bargained and paid for: a console, game and/or accessory at a price to which both parties agreed.”
Nintendo added, in language cited by multiple outlets tracking the case, that “the money Plaintiffs paid represents the purchase price of the goods they wanted and received; Plaintiffs are not entitled to a rebate simply because of intervening legal developments related to tariffs.”
Notably, Nintendo’s filing also pushes back on the idea that it fully passed tariff costs on to shoppers. Game Developer reports the company claimed it did in fact absorb some tariff costs — unlike some of its “market peers” — and only chose to implement “modest” price adjustments, stressing that pricing decisions were also influenced by rising memory costs. Nintendo’s lawyers wrote that, “like its market peers, Nintendo made the difficult decision to adjust some of its prices in response to market conditions including costs of memory, labor, shipping, and tariffs,” but that “unlike many of its market peers, however, Nintendo did not simply increase each product’s price by the amount of tariffs it paid on that product or impose an across-the-board tariff surcharge.”
Nintendo Shares Slide 4% in Tokyo as the Legal Fight Widens
The dismissal bid lands against the backdrop of Nintendo’s own separate tariff litigation against Washington. Nintendo sued the U.S. government in March, after the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA-based tariffs earlier this year, seeking to recover duties it had already paid. TechCrunch reported that Nintendo told the outlet at the time, “We can confirm that we have filed a request,” adding “We have nothing else to share on the topic.”
According to Forbes, which cited Associated Press reporting on the motion, shares of Nintendo dropped 4% in Tokyo-based trading on Tuesday following the filing. Forbes also noted that Nintendo is one of only a handful of major companies weighing in publicly on whether tariff refunds should flow back to consumers, and that Ford, which has said it would not pass on tariff refunds, faces a proposed class-action lawsuit in Michigan from consumers who claim they should receive reimbursement, after Ford previously said it expected a one-time $1.3 billion refund.
GoNintendo’s tracking of the case adds that the federal refund process central to the dispute has already begun moving, noting the U.S. government’s plans to refund companies, a process that started earlier this week.
Why the Case Stops at the US Border for Now
The class action is confined to U.S. purchasers, since IEEPA tariffs were a U.S. import measure and the proposed class covers only buyers inside the country during the specified window. Nintendo has not signalled any equivalent rebate discussion for New Zealand or Australian customers, where console and accessory pricing is set independently of U.S. tariff policy and typically reflects GST, freight and currency factors rather than American import duties.
Even so, the outcome could matter for the wider Nintendo ecosystem: a win for Nintendo would reinforce that once-off pricing decisions tied to volatile trade policy carry no retroactive strings, a precedent other publishers and hardware makers navigating tariff-driven pricing globally will be watching closely.
Read also: Nintendo Sued by Gamers Over US Tariff Refunds in Washington Class Action
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