Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators: 11 September 2025

• For trading businesses, the three biggest challenges affecting business turnover during early September 2025 were economic uncertainty (28%), competition (23%), and labour costs (18%); additionally, around 1 in 5 (21%) businesses said labour costs were a factor causing them to consider raising prices in October 2025 (initial results from Wave 140 of the Business Insights and Conditions Survey).

• In our latest Opinions and Lifestyle Survey (OPN), when asked in which ways their cost of living had increased over the past month, the majority of people reported that the price of their food shop had increased (96%), and over half reported increases in gas or electricity bills (55%) (initial findings for August 2025 from our OPN, publishing on 19 September 2025).

• The seasonally adjusted Direct Debit failure rate and the average transaction amount remained broadly unchanged in August 2025 compared with July 2025; when compared with August 2024, these values increased by 6% and 2%, respectively (Vocalink and Pay.UK).

• Total Revolut debit card expenditure decreased by 5% in the week to 7 September 2025, compared with the previous week, but increased by 13% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (Revolut).

• The total number of ship visits to major UK ports decreased by 4% in the week to 7 September 2025, compared with the previous week, and decreased by 11% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (exactEarth).

• The seasonally adjusted number of daily UK flights decreased by 3% in the week to 7 September 2025, compared with the previous week, but increased by 1% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (EUROCONTROL).

• The System Average Price (SAP) of gas decreased by 2% in the week to 7 September 2025, compared with the previous week, and decreased by 12% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (National Gas Transmission).

• The number of Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPCs) lodged for new dwellings in England and Wales increased by 12% in the week to 7 September 2025, compared with the previous week, but decreased by 28% when compared with the equivalent week of 2024 (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government).

Notes

1. Card spending over time increased because of the impacts of both inflation on value of transactions and cash-to-card conversion.

2. Revolut adjustments to user count are at an aggregate level and as such age bands may not adjust evenly.

3. Indicators with "SA" in the title have been seasonally adjusted.

4. Existing weekly EPC data can show sudden spikes when housing associations lodge multiple expired EPCs at once.

This section lists a selection of data available in this publication. Please note that because of our data-sharing agreement with MRI onLocation, we are unable to provide a dataset for our footfall metric. For the full list of available datasets, please see our accompanying dataset page.

Real-time indicator

A real-time indicator provides insights into economic activity using close-to-real-time big data, administrative data sources, rapid-response surveys or experimental estimates, which represent useful economic and social concepts.

Seasonal adjustment

Seasonal adjustment is the identification and removal of consistent and systematic variation in time series associated with the time of year. For more information on seasonal variation, and how we implement seasonal adjustment, see Section 2: How we measure real-time indicators, of our Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators methodology article.

Official statistics in development

These statistics are labelled as official statistics in development. Until September 2023, these were called "experimental statistics". Read more about the change in our Guide to official statistics in development.

We are developing how we collect and produce the data to improve the quality of these statistics. Find out more in our Economic activity and social change in the UK, real-time indicators methodology article.

Once the developments are complete, we will review the statistics with the Statistics Head of Profession. We will decide if the statistics are of sufficient quality and value to be published as official statistics, or if further development is needed. Production may be stopped if they are not of sufficient quality or value. Users will be informed of the outcome and any changes.

We value your feedback on these statistics. If you would like to get in touch, please email realtime.indicators@ons.gov.uk.

Dataset release dates and intended release frequency

Latest release dates and intended release frequency of our associated datasets are available in this section. Please note that there may be some change to the intended release frequency for a variety of reasons, such as data availability. If you would like further information about any of these datasets, or previous release dates, please email realtime.indicators@ons.gov.uk.

Weekly data release

• Revolut spending on debit cards dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Automotive fuel spending dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Advanced notification of potential redundancies dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• System Average Price of gas dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• System Price of electricity dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPC) dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Weekly shipping indicators dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Daily UK flights dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Company incorporations, voluntary dissolutions and compulsory dissolutions dataset; updated 30 January 2025.

Monthly data release

• Monthly Direct Debit failure rate and average transaction amount dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

• Textkernel new online job adverts dataset; updated 29 August 2025.

• Value Added Tax (VAT) flash estimates dataset; updated 21 August 2025.

• Renter affordability for new tenancies dataset; updated 11 September 2025.

Quarterly data release

• Sales and jobs in small businesses dataset; updated 7 November 2024.

Strengths and limitations

These statistics have been produced to provide timely indicators of the effect of developing world events on the UK economy and society. We use close-to-real-time big data, administrative data sources, rapid-response surveys, or official statistics in development.

The data presented in this bulletin are reviewed and refreshed on a regular basis. Indicators are swapped in and out of the publication based on their suitability and availability.

Seasonality

Seasonal fluctuations are likely to be present in many of these indicators, so caution must be applied when interpreting changes in series that are not seasonally adjusted.