The CMA’s Veterinary Services Market Investigation is ongoing and has not yet determined whether remedies will be required. However, this week the CMA published a working paper outlining potential themes and considerations that may inform any proposed remedies, should they be deemed necessary. The paper also explores the potential impact of such measures. Stakeholders are invited to respond to the consultation by 5:00 p.m. on Tuesday, 27 May 2025. The CMA Remedies working paper can be found here.

Brief summary of proposed remedies

The working paper sets the remedies out in themes:

  1. Measures to increase transparency and pet owners’ ability to compare between FOPs and referral providers.
  2. Measures to increase transparency and pet owners’ ability to compare different treatments, services and referral options.
  3. Measures to remove limits or constraints on the choices offered to pet owners.
  4. Measures to provide additional information about the option to purchase online and measures to increase online purchases of medicines.
  5. Measures to increase competition in outsourced OOH services.
  6. Measures to increase transparency of cremations prices; (potentially) measures to restrict retail prices.
  7. Recommendations for government, RCVS, VMD. Requirements on vet businesses to cover the regulatory gap until new legislation is in place.
  8. Making sure local competitive conditions do not worsen in future.

More detailed breakdown

  1. Transparency and Comparisons Between Practices:
    Improve the ability of pet owners to compare prices and services between first opinion (FOP) and referral veterinary providers, this includes prices of treatments, medicines, prescription feeds, dispensing fees and broader services offered. It proposes a website which gives a platform for price comparison for pet owners.
  2. Treatment and Service Transparency:
    Help pet owners compare different treatment options, services, and referrals more easily by increasing information availability.
  3. Expand Consumer Choice:
    Remove barriers that limit the options available to pet owners when choosing veterinary care.
  4. Online Medicine Purchasing:
    Raise awareness about the option to buy medicines online and encourage more online purchases to improve affordability, alongside better price comparison. It would also require generic prescribing to increase brand competition for medicine sales, purchased online to show consumers full variety. It proposes price controls for prescription medicines.
  5. Out-of-Hours (OOH) Competition:
    Promote more competition among providers of outsourced emergency and out-of-hours vet services – this would be done by restriction in contact clauses e.g cost of exit fee or contract length.
  6. Cremation Price Transparency and Regulation:
    Increase clarity on pet cremation costs, as well as choices such as individual or communal, and possibly introduce price controls to prevent overcharging.
  7. Regulatory Oversight and Interim Measures:
    Recommend actions for government and regulatory bodies (RCVS, VMD), and impose temporary requirements on vet businesses to bridge regulatory gaps until new laws are introduced. This could include new quality measures, consumer and competition duty, compliance monitoring, and proportionate enforcement. Furthermore, it may look at complaints and redress mechanism, requiring vet businesses to have effective in house systems, participate in VCMS, raise awareness of VCMS and use complaint insights to improved standards. It also considers the introduction of a veterinary ombudsman. Additionally, this clause would consider the effective use of vet nurses, protecting the titles, clarifying frameworks and expanding the role with reforms.
  8. Safeguarding Future Competition: Ensure that local veterinary markets remain competitive and do not become more concentrated or restrictive over time – there is no proposed immediate remedies for this, but CMA will reserve the right to scrutinise future mergers.

The remedies document is highly detailed, spanning 162 pages and accompanied by 105 consultation questions. The CMA’s proposed remedies aim to address concerns around transparency, consumer choice, competition, and regulation within the veterinary services market. While no final decisions have been made, the scope and scale of the consultation signal a significant potential shift in how veterinary services operate in the UK. ADUK is carefully considering the implications for assistance dog partnerships and the wider animal welfare sector and will continue to engage with the process to ensure these perspectives are reflected in any future recommendations.