One rulebook for a two-sided market
Delivery platforms coordinate merchants and consumers while controlling ranking, checkout, payment, and often delivery. A rule that changes only one side can shift costs or conduct elsewhere. Decision 109 therefore combines price ceilings with rules for access, information, execution, and enforcement.
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The price ceilings are only one part of the instrument
Merchant-facing provisions also address exclusivity, retaliation, data access, payout timing, bundling, and discriminatory ranking. Consumer-facing provisions cover pre-checkout disclosure, paid-placement labels, refunds, complaints, and responsibility for order execution. MOCI can request pricing and commission data and, when appropriate, an independent audit.
The 2026 regulatory sequence
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Official MOCI metadata confirms the instrument, and the Gazette index confirms issue 1799 on 12 July 2026. The coded text records an alignment deadline of 1 September. These dates establish the legal sequence. They do not show when platforms or merchants changed behavior.
What the explainer does and does not establish
The explainer maps the rulebook's mechanisms. It does not measure actual commissions, pass-through, checkout prices, merchant exit, platform entry, service quality, ranking, rider pay, complaints, or welfare.
The source hierarchy is now explicit. The official MOCI-hosted PDF supplies the 22 provision-level entries, while the secondary-hosted scan and transcript remain cross-checks. MOCI's page has a metadata inconsistency: its URL and title refer to Decision 6/2026, but the visible body identifies Decision 109/2026. The PDF and Gazette issue are therefore cited separately.
Citation and sources
Suggested citation: Abdulmalik Altararwa. 2026. "Kuwait's 2026 Platform Rulebook." Regulatory explainer, provisional.
Sources: Article-level coding comes from the official MOCI-hosted Decision 109/2026 PDF. Instrument metadata is cross-checked against the MOCI page and Kuwait Official Gazette issue 1799. The MOCI page's Decision 6/2026 URL/title conflicts with its visible Decision 109/2026 identification; the secondary-hosted scan and transcript remain cross-checks.
Public-release boundary: This page publishes aggregate estimates, original figures, and source links. It does not publish raw records, restricted data, or local research files.