What has happened?
The CMA has imposed a fine of £473,000 on a business that failed to respond to a request for information (RFI) under the new Digital Markets Competition and Consumers Act 2024. The CMA can impose fines for such breaches of up to 1% of a company’s annual worldwide turnover, or £30,000, whichever is higher. Additionally, daily penalties of up to 5% of daily turnover (or £15,000, whichever higher) can be imposed for continued non-compliance.
Importantly, these fines can be imposed by the CMA without it having to go to court (although affected parties have a right to appeal the fine to the court).
How did the failure occur?
The regulator administered an information notice to Euro Car Parks Ltd (ECP), which it failed to respond to. Businesses that have a "reasonable excuse" for failing to respond to an RFI might not be enforced against.
ECP argued that it had a reasonable excuse as there was defective service of the information notice. In particular, the relevant director on whom it was served did not play a quotidian part in the business at the relevant time, nor were they physically present in the country.
It also said that the nature of the CMA's letters and emails caused recipients to think the correspondence was fraudulent, including, for example, use of an exclamation mark and its "official" classification. These excuses were rejected.
Attempted injunction
The fine was contained in a final enforcement notice served to ECP in December 2025, although the notice was not published until 13 February 2026, owing to an attempted injunction by ECP to prevent the CMA from naming it. That attempt failed.
Level of the fine
Despite ECP's attempts to argue the near-half-million-pound fine was disproportionate, the CMA maintained its classification of the breach as (highest level) category 1, given the two-month investigatory delay precipitated by ECP's non-response and the ensuing requirement for additional regulatory resources.
What does this mean for you?
The enforcement serves as a reminder that information notices should be reviewed and responded to expeditiously. Businesses should train relevant staff on how to identify regulatory communications and the need to escalate them quickly.
