An automotive fuel pump housing for a fuel pump encases a rotary pumping element. The housing has two portions, a cover and a bottom. The cover has an inlet port which defines a directional control surface having an inclined frustoconical portion and an inclined planar portion conjoined therewith and laterally extending therefrom such that fuel flowing over the inclined frustoconical portion accelerates primarily radially and combines with fuel flowing primarily axially over the inclined planar portion, whereby the combined flow is smoothly directed to an annular cover channel. The bottom has an annular bottom channel which, when the cover and bottom are assembled, the annular cover channel and annular bottom channel cooperate to form the inlet channel. A transition section is located at the beginning of the inlet channel and extends along a portion of the arc of the inlet channel. The transition section decreases in depth from a maximum depth at the beginning thereof to the depth of the remaining portion of the inlet channel. The annular cover channel has a two-step transition section depth whereas the annular bottom channel has a single-step transition section depth. In addition, the radius of the base circle of the inlet channel outside of the transition section is not less than the radius of the rotary pumping element near the vane grooves.