UK forecourts have a new legal duty to make pump prices transparent in near real time. The Motor Fuel Price (Open Data) Regulations 2025 (SI 2025/1356), signed on 17 December 2025 by Energy minister Martin McCluskey, begin in stages: registration and some enforcement from 18 December 2025, then live price reporting and open data sharing from 2 February 2026, according to legislation.gov.uk. Government will appoint an ‘aggregator’ to run the scheme.

For retailers, the first task is registration. Before 2 February 2026 every petrol filling station must supply the aggregator with core details: trading and brand names, address, latitude and longitude, usual opening hours, facilities, grades usually sold, the current selling price per litre, temporary closure status, and named contacts including a designated ‘reporter’. Each site is then given a unique ID. Changes to registration details must be notified within three days, and permanent closures warned 28 days ahead where foreseen.

Price changes move on a faster clock. Whenever a grade of petrol or diesel changes at a site, the new selling price-defined as the per‑litre price before any discounts-must be sent to the aggregator within 30 minutes. New sites opening on or after 2 February 2026 must complete registration within seven days of first sale.

The aggregator must make compliance practical by offering four routes to submit data: an online portal, SMS text message, an automated phone system, and an application programming interface. Once a retailer sends reportable information, the aggregator has five minutes to update the public price API. It must also publish a flat file twice daily so data users can snapshot the market.

Access is open but governed by standards. Any ‘information recipient’ can register to take the dataset, yet the aggregator may set technical conditions for API and flat file use and can withhold access if those standards are ignored. It must publish clear guidance on trader rights and obligations and run procedures to handle complaints about inaccuracies.

Enforcement sits with the Competition and Markets Authority. The CMA can issue compliance notices, demand attendance and documents, and publish the fact of non‑compliance. Financial penalties are material: a fixed fine up to 1% of an undertaking’s worldwide turnover and, if a breach continues, a daily amount up to 5% of worldwide daily turnover. Providing false or misleading information, or obstructing access to information or systems, is a criminal offence punishable by a fine.

Timings matter for planning. From 18 December 2025, registration duties and linked monitoring, penalty and appeals provisions apply for those duties. From 2 February 2026, the 30-minute reporting and nationwide sharing begin, and the wider enforcement powers attach to those parts. Appeals on penalties go to the Competition Appeal Tribunal within 28 days. The Secretary of State must review the regime within five years.

For forecourt operators, this is operational work. Teams need a clean hand‑off between who sets pump prices, who updates POS, and the named ‘reporter’ who files changes. Rural independents with patchy connectivity should plan to rely on SMS or the automated phone line as a back‑up. Larger chains will integrate the API but should still keep a manual fail‑safe for weekends and bank holidays.

For consumers and data firms, the upside is near real‑time visibility. Price‑comparison apps will ingest the API within minutes of a change, while the twice‑daily flat file suits batch services. Because the dataset includes geo‑coordinates, grades and hours, expect sharper routing tools and loyalty overlays. Developers should budget for technical standards, rate limits and testing windows set by the aggregator.

This scheme sits under the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025. Practical next steps include naming your ‘reporter’, validating coordinates and amenities, aligning pump‑price workflows to a 30‑minute service level, and testing at least two submission channels. As legislation.gov.uk notes, penalties are calculated on worldwide turnover, so even a UK‑only breach can escalate quickly for multinational groups. We will be watching for the aggregator’s technical standards and the CMA’s penalty guidance.