United Kingdom: Consumer Protection

In April 2025, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) acquired new powers to enforce consumer rights under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCCA).

You may remember that in November last year, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched a 'major consumer protection' enforcement drive targeting eight businesses over concerns about price transparency.

In its annual plan for 2026-2027, published in March, the CMA said it would focus consumer enforcement on the clearest and most serious harms, including terms that are obviously imbalanced or unfair.

The Competition and Markets Authority has launched an investigation into Ryanair's practice of charging parents to sit with their children aged 2-11, examining whether these mandatory fees violate consumer protection laws.

The Advertising Standards Authority has tightened its enforcement on "clinically proven" beauty claims, requiring brands to substantiate such assertions with rigorous clinical trials rather than consumer use tests.

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority has launched formal investigations into eight companies over potentially misleading pricing practices, including hidden fees, fake countdown timers, and pre-selected extras. With new powers to impose fines up to 10% of global turnover without court proceedings, the CMA is signaling a major shift in how online pricing compliance will be enforced across all industries.

Local food authorities wield significant investigative powers when it comes to food safety violations, resulting in hundreds of business prosecutions annually.

The UK pharmaceutical sector faces significant challenges from counterfeit medicines that threaten patient safety and undermine legitimate supply chains. This analysis examines the current landscape of pharmaceutical counterfeiting...

Unsafe products are a hot topic for the UK government. Last year, the UK Parliament passed the Product Regulation and Metrology Act 2025 and has now launched three new product safety consultations.

HM Treasury has unveiled comprehensive reforms to the Consumer Credit Act 1974, marking the most significant overhaul of consumer credit regulation in decades.

HM Treasury has published its Policy Statement on reform of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 (CCA), setting out the planned policy direction following the Phase 1 consultation which closed in July 2025. The statement confirms the intention to repeal many provisions of the CCA, recasting these within the Financial Conduct Authority's (FCA) Handbook (though not necessarily as a direct copy-out). 

The UK government has announced significant reforms to the Consumer Credit Act 1974, scrapping the phase two consultation and moving forward with changes that will remove automatic unenforceability sanctions while shifting many prescriptive requirements from statute to FCA rules.