The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) opened the Euro Car Parks investigation on 15 July 2026, examining whether the company’s practice of issuing parking charges to drivers queuing at petrol forecourts breaches consumer protection law. The regulator is also scrutinising Euro Car Parks’ broader appeals process across its petrol station and car park estate.
The probe is part of a wider crackdown on private parking operators. But the history between the CMA and Euro Car Parks gives this particular case a sharper edge than most.
A Regulator With Prior History
In December 2025, the CMA fined Euro Car Parks £473,000 for failing to comply with a legally binding information notice issued under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. According to DWF Group, it was the CMA’s first civil penalty under its enhanced powers granted by that legislation.
That fine did not concern a proven consumer protection infringement. As Wilson Sonsini noted at the time, it solely concerned the company’s failure to respond to the information notice; no substantive investigation into its practices had been opened at that stage. Euro Car Parks appealed the £473,000 penalty, and that appeal was still ongoing when the new investigation was formally launched, according to Lewis Silkin.
The sequence matters. The CMA sought information, Euro Car Parks resisted, a fine followed, an appeal ensued, and now a full consumer protection investigation has been opened. That is a pattern of escalation, not a routine regulatory enquiry.
What the Euro Car Parks Investigation Actually Covers
The CMA’s case focuses on two things: whether it is lawful for charges to be issued to drivers queuing for, or using, petrol pumps and services such as car washes; and whether the company’s appeals process meets the standards consumer law requires. The evidence-gathering stage is expected to run until Spring 2027.
Euro Car Parks operates more than 3,000 facilities across the UK and Ireland, with more than two million cars using its sites every day. The potential scope of any adverse finding is not small.
The CMA’s executive director of consumer protection, Emma Cochrane, did not understate the stakes: ‘Costs are high and often unexpected which is difficult when people are budgeting carefully. Parking companies must treat motorists fairly at all stages, and a clear and consistent appeals process must be at the heart of this.’
The AA’s head of roads policy, Jack Cousens, put it more bluntly. Drivers are ‘already feeling the pinch with rising pump prices,’ he said, and should not face a parking charge ‘for simply waiting their turn.’
The Scale of the Wider Problem
The backdrop to this investigation is a parking ticket industry that has expanded dramatically and shows no sign of slowing. RAC data shows that private parking companies issued 14,371,841 tickets in the year from April 2024 to March 2025, more than double the 6,808,344 issued in 2018-19. That was the year before Parliament passed legislation intended to clamp down on rogue operators.
To reach those numbers, firms made nearly 4,000 requests a day to the DVLA for vehicle keeper details over the same period. The legislation Parliament passed did not slow the machine down.
The RAC now predicts the 2024-25 record will be surpassed by as much as 3 million in the following year, based on an average of 4.3 million tickets issued per quarter. Seventeen million private parking tickets in a single year would represent a significant public problem well beyond the reach of any one investigation.
RAC head of policy Simon Williams called the CMA’s effort a ‘major step forward in ensuring drivers are treated fairly by private parking operators.’ He also pointed to an important pending variable: the government’s response to a consultation on reinstating the withdrawn Private Parking Code of Practice. The AA’s Cousens raised a more immediate concern, warning that a potential cabinet reshuffle could delay that legislation further.
I think the CMA is right to pursue this. Charging someone for sitting in a petrol queue is not a grey area. It is the kind of practice that erodes public confidence in private enforcement far more broadly. The question is whether the evidence-gathering stage, running to Spring 2027, produces action before the ticket count climbs to 17 million.
