The CMA Enforcement Policy and Guidance thread covers the Competition and Markets Authority's ongoing programme to update, consult on, and publish guidance governing how it enforces competition law (CA98), merger control, cartel leniency, consumer protection, and administrative penalties. It encompasses a rolling series of consultations and final guidance documents that define the CMA's procedural and substantive enforcement approach.
These guidance documents set the practical rules of engagement for businesses, legal advisers, and complainants dealing with CMA investigations; changes to penalty calculation, leniency policy, and consumer enforcement powers directly affect litigation risk and compliance strategy across the UK economy. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 has significantly expanded the CMA's consumer enforcement toolkit, making updated guidance especially consequential.
A new consultation on transparency and disclosure general guidance opened in April 2026 and is currently live. Recent months have seen final guidance published on unfair commercial practices, consumer protection enforcement, administrative penalties, and the Taking Regulatory Action policy, following completed consultations.
Final guidance on business-to-consumer trading conduct prohibited under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, setting out how the CMA will interpret and enforce the new unfair commercial practices regime.
Comprehensive overview of the CMA's role, functions, and powers in consumer protection enforcement, updated to reflect the expanded toolkit under the DMCC Act 2024.
Secretary of State-approved statement of the CMA's policy for imposing administrative penalties, updated in December 2024 to reflect current enforcement practice.
Final outcome of the consultation completing the 2019-initiated update to the CMA's overarching policy on how it decides to take regulatory action, covering prioritisation and case selection.
Final outcome of the consultation on revised leniency and no-action guidance for cartel cases, updating the incentives and procedures for businesses and individuals to self-report cartel conduct.
Updated guidance setting out the CMA's methodology for calculating financial penalties for Competition Act 1998 infringements, incorporating changes following the 2021 consultation.
Directly updates a core CMA enforcement procedure document; follows the 2024 outcome on the same guidance and is part of the same rolling transparency and disclosure workstream.
Completed the previous cycle of transparency and disclosure guidance reform, directly feeding into the current 2026 consultation.
Core enforcement policy document directly on this thread; the consultation and outcome are central to the CMA's enforcement policy update programme.
Cartel leniency policy is a named component of this enforcement policy thread.
CA98 procedures guidance is a foundational enforcement document directly within scope of this thread.
Part of the iterative penalty guidance reform cycle that is central to this enforcement policy thread.
Why linked: The April 2025 joint statement between DBT and CMA sets out the government's commitment to deploying new consumer protection enforcement powers under the DMCC Act 2024, directly shaping the enforcement guidance on this thread.
Guidance on business conduct that the law on unfair business-to-consumer trading prohibits under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024.
Statement from the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) on how new powers in the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act will deliver effective consumer protection.
This guidance provides an overview of the Competition and Markets Authority's (CMA) role, functions and powers in relation to consumer protection.
This document sets out guidance on the Competition and Markets Authority's (CMA) exercise of our information gathering powers when we monitor competition in connection with road fuel in the UK.
This guidance document is the CMA's statement of policy for these purposes and was approved by the Secretary of State for Business and Trade on 17 December 2024.
This guidance sets out the method the CMA uses when calculating financial penalties for CA98 infringements. This guidance includes changes made to the previous guidance following a consultation process in July 2021.
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