UK pricing rules and local fees: what travel businesses need to know

Since April 2025, the price you advertise must include every fee your customer can't avoid. For holidays, that includes local taxes and resort fees paid at the hotel. Here's what the rules say and what to do about them.

Updated October 2026 · 6 min read · Top Dog Travel Systems

What changed

The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCC Act) brought in new consumer protection rules from 6 April 2025. Drip pricing, where mandatory charges appear late in the booking, is banned. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) can now fine businesses directly, up to 10% of global turnover, without going to court.

In November 2025 the CMA published its price transparency guidance, explaining how it expects businesses to show prices.

What counts as an unavoidable fee

Any charge your customer has to pay to take the holiday. For travel that typically means:

  • tourist, city and occupancy taxes
  • mandatory resort fees
  • other compulsory local charges

Optional extras the customer chooses, like excursions or upgrades, aren't unavoidable.

Fees paid at the hotel, in another currency

The CMA treats local taxes and resort fees as normally calculable, so they belong in the headline price even when the customer pays them at the hotel, to the hotel or to a local authority, and in a foreign currency. Convert them at current exchange rates, include them in the total, and explain clearly what's paid now and what's paid locally.

"From" prices count too

A "from" price in an advert, email or search result is still a price. It needs to include the unavoidable fees as well.

When a fee genuinely can't be calculated

If part of a charge really can't be worked out in advance, show it next to the headline price with equal prominence, with enough information for the customer to work out what they'll pay.

What to do now

  • List everywhere a price appears: website, search results, emails, adverts, feeds to third parties
  • Find the local fees for the hotels you sell, and a way to keep them current
  • Include them in every headline and "from" price, converted at current rates
  • Show customers what they pay now and what they pay at the hotel
  • Record how you calculate prices, in case you're asked

How Local Fees helps

Local Fees holds the fees for the hotels you sell, keeps them current and adds them to your prices automatically, in the Interactive Reservations System, on Top Dog websites or on any other website through its API.

This guide is general information, not legal advice. Take your own advice on how the rules apply to your business. Source: CMA, Price transparency (CMA209).

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