Watchdog To Tackle Rip-Off Fuel Prices

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The Competition & Markets Authority is to get new powers to help stop consumers and businesses that rely on their cars and vans from being ripped-off at the fuel pumps.

UK motorists can expect some protection under tough new powers that will shine a light on any attempt from retailers to unfairly hike up petrol and diesel prices.

Under an amendment to the Digital Markets, Competition & Consumers Bill, the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) will become the body responsible for closely monitoring road fuel prices and reporting any sign of malpractice to the government.

The move aims to help improve competition by making sure customers across the country are given a fair choice of prices when they buy fuel.

Fuel retailers, including supermarkets, will be forced to come clean on how much they are charging customers on their forecourts versus their profits. Those that fail to comply could face a fixed fine from the watchdog of up to 1% of their worldwide turnover or an ongoing fine of up to 5% of daily turnover.

Energy Security Secretary, Claire Coutinho, has cautioned retailers that she will not hesitate to hold them to account, if there is any evidence of unfairly hiking up prices and holding back savings from UK motorists.

The warning follows a report from the CMA earlier this year that revealed some supermarkets had failed to pass on savings in oil prices - charging drivers 6p more per litre for fuel, which amounted to £900 million in extra costs in 2022 alone.

Coutinho says: “At a time when many were struggling with increased living costs, we saw shocking behaviour from some fuel retailers who failed to pass on savings at the pump. Now we are cracking down on any petrol station bosses found to be unfairly hiking up their prices.”

Transparency

Although many retailers have voluntarily increased transparency of their costs and returns, the CMA also revealed that Shell and Moto-way had failed to meet their information requests, despite calls from the Energy Security Secretary to do so.

On top of this, twelve of the biggest retailers, including all four fuel-selling supermarkets, have already signed up to the CMA’s voluntary scheme to share daily price data – allowing news outlets and websites to create price comparison tools for customers to easily compare costs.

The government is progressing plans to make this legal requirement for fuel retailers to share daily price information that will help customers to easily shop around for deals. A consultation on the design of government’s open data scheme is due to launch this autumn.

Picture: The Competition & Markets Authority will get powers to make fuel retailers cut prices at the pump when wholesale prices come down.

Article written by Cathryn Ellis
19th March 2024

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