TIMESCALE FOR RESPONSES

Requests for personal information under the DPA

There is an absolute requirement under Section 7 of the DPA to meet requests for personal information within 40 calendar days of receipt of the request and fee.

In exceptional circumstances due to the quantity and complexity of the information the Council may find itself unable to meet this deadline, e.g. Social Services information.  In such circumstances the Council will communicate regularly with the applicant by whatever means appropriate to apologise for any delay and to keep him/her informed of progress.

The Council will seek to release whatever information it can within the 40-day deadline.

Requests under the FOIA

The Council will aim to respond to all requests for information within 20 working days of the receipt of the application, as stipulated by the legislation.  It is important that the 20 working day period is not seen as the target but the maximum period in which to respond.  The Council should not delay responding to a request if the information can reasonably be provided earlier. It is recognised, however, that there will be some complex cases when the public interest test applies where it will not be possible to deal with such applications within this period.

Where a delay in reaching a decision beyond this period is expected to occur due to the consideration of the public interest test, the Council must give a realistic and reasonable estimate of when a decision will be reached.  This revised estimate must be complied with unless there are good reasons for not doing so.  If this estimate is exceeded, the applicant should receive an apology and an explanation for the delay.  It is imperative that the applicant is informed if the estimate is proving unrealistic.

Records must be kept of all instances where estimates are exceeded so that steps can be taken to rectify the problem where it happens more than occasionally.

Requests under any other statutory access regimes

Where deadlines for the provision of information are stipulated under other statutory access regimes, such deadlines will continue to apply and are not overridden by the FOIA.