What are the cost limits for a Freedom of Information Act request?
There is no ‘flat rate’ fee to receive information and in many cases the information will be provided to you free of charge. An authority can refuse a request if it estimates that it will cost them in excess of the appropriate cost limit to fulfil your request. The limit is £600 for central government and Parliament and £450 for other public authorities. Where the limit is not exceeded, the only charges that can be passed to you are those associated with providing the information, for example photocopying and postage. These are collectively known as disbursements. An authority may be willing to provide the information even where the cost exceeds the limit if you are willing to pay the full costs in dealing with the request. They can also decide to provide the information free of charge, despite the application of the appropriate limit if they wish.
The appropriate cost limit for a request is £600 for central government and Parliament and £450 for other public authorities. This means when you receive a request you need to estimate how much it will cost to deal with it, and if it will be within this limit. When estimating the cost of compliance, you can take into consideration the cost of: • Determining whether it holds the information requested • Locating the information • Retrieving such information or documents • The cost of staff time associated with these activities is currently calculated at £25 per hour. You can not take the time spent considering whether or not information is exempt from release into account when estimating the cost of compliance.
