UK Watchdog Proposes 21 Reforms to Fix Broken Veterinary Services Market

Prescription fees at UK vet practices, for which many surgeries charge £30 or more per medicine, will be capped at £21 for the first medicine and £12.50 for any additional medicines under a sweeping package of reforms that the Competition and Markets Authority published today, concluding what inquiry group chairman Martin Coleman called "the most extensive review of veterinary services in a generation."

The legally binding measures include mandatory price lists, prescription fee caps, a price comparison website and requirements for large corporate chains to brand themselves clearly — changes the CMA said will make the £6.3 billion veterinary services market work properly for the first time. Pet owners using a vet practice that is part of a larger chain can expect to see changes before Christmas, including standard price lists.

The CMA's final report covers 21 distinct remedies. Practices must publish a comprehensive price list for standard services, including consultations, common procedures, diagnostics, written prescriptions and cremation options. Practices must also provide a written estimate in advance for any treatment expected to cost £500 or more, including aftercare costs, as well as an itemised bill, with emergency care the only exception.

The scale of the market's transparency failure underpinned the regulator's case for intervention. The CMA found that 84% of vet practice websites carried no pricing information at all, and that fees have risen at almost twice the rate of inflation, with pet owners not being given enough information about their vet and the prices of treatments. The investigation also found that vets and veterinary businesses are not providing pet owners with the information they need to choose between different practices or treatment options, and that high prescription fees and delays in obtaining written prescriptions create barriers to purchasing medicines elsewhere.

Vets will also be required to inform pet owners about the savings they can make by buying medicines online and to provide owners of pets with an ongoing need for medication automatically with a written prescription to enable them to buy medicine online. Prices and information about who owns the surgery are to be made available to pet owners through the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons' Find a Vet service, which will share the data with third-party comparison sites.

The concentration of ownership in the sector drove much of the CMA's concern about pricing. The regulator found that pet owners pay 16.6% more on average at large vet groups than at independent practices. CVS Group, which runs about 500 vet practices in the UK, said it was "pleased to see that the CMA has considered our and the veterinary profession's feedback in amending the proposed fee cap on prescriptions" with the cap raised to £21 inclusive of VAT for the first drug prescribed.

British Veterinary Association president Rob Williams said: "The majority of the CMA's measures focus on increasing transparency and information, which will help pet owners make more informed choices and support competition, which is a really positive step." Williams acknowledged that prices had risen sharply but cited higher operating costs and advances in diagnostics as contributing factors.

Medivet, which has more than 350 branches in the UK, said it already published prices for key treatments online and would engage constructively with the CMA. Pets at Home said its Vets for Pets chain, which operates most of its 451 practices as joint ventures with local vets, had been calling on government to update sector rules for more than two years.

The next stage gives the CMA six months to put legally binding orders in place, with those orders required by 23 September 2026. Once the CMA orders are made, nearly all remedies will be in place in the following three to twelve months, with smaller veterinary businesses given three months longer than larger practices to implement the changes. The CMA launched its review of the sector in September 2023, drawing 56,000 responses, including 45,000 from the general public and 11,000 from those working in the veterinary industry, equivalent to around a fifth of all UK vets and veterinary nurses.