Fuel prices: VSPV calls for a reduction in the energy tax.

The association of private commercial road passenger transport in North Rhine-Westphalia is calling for a reduction of the energy tax on diesel and gasoline due to the rising fuel prices. The association has addressed Federal Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil on September 15, 2026. Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Katherina Reiche were also informed about the letter. The VSPV justifies its demand by stating that, in particular, taxi, rental car, patient transport, and emergency medical services companies cannot pass on higher fuel costs to their customers or clients in the short term.

Fuel prices rise significantly

According to the association, fuel prices on Monday at the 12:00 price update nationwide rose on average by around 20 cents per liter. At individual filling stations, the increase amounted to 30 cents. Diesel had already on Sunday, in the daily average, cost more than €2.40 per liter and was thus only a few cents below the record high from April.

The VSPV represents, according to its own statements, around 800 taxi and rental-car companies, bus companies, patient transport companies, as well as private emergency medical service companies. The businesses could not, or only to a limited extent in the short term, offset rising operating costs through their prices, according to the association.

Fares cannot be adjusted in the short term

For taxi companies, this restriction arises in part from tariff binding. The competent approval authorities set the transport charges according to Section 51 of the Passenger Transport Act. Adjustments require procedures and corresponding municipal decisions.

Also for medical transport trips and patient transports, the remuneration is contractually agreed with the health insurance funds. For private emergency medical service providers, the fees are set through agreements with the respective operators of the emergency medical service. Thus the companies cannot immediately offset short-term increases in fuel costs through higher prices.

Austria serves as a model

The association therefore demands a legally regulated mechanism for reducing the energy tax. As a model, the VSPV points to Austria. There, additional value-added tax revenues resulting from higher fuel prices are taken into account in the level of the mineral oil tax.

The Austrian mechanism provides for determining the additional VAT revenues from higher fuel prices for the preceding month. From this, reduced mineral oil tax rates for gasoline and diesel can be derived.

A reduction of the VAT, however, is not considered an appropriate relief for companies with input tax deduction by the VSPV. Therefore, the association calls for relief to be implemented directly via the energy tax.

Automatic mechanism instead of a case-by-case decision

According to the VSPV's proposals, the tax relief should not be designed as a short-term one-off measure. Instead, the association calls for a statutory regulation that automatically comes into effect upon a defined price increase and ties the amount of the relief to the actually incurred additional tax revenues.

This would, in the view of the association, give companies greater planning certainty in the face of rapidly rising fuel costs.