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Handling of FOI requests

RFI-2025-1545
Friday, 31 October 2025

Request

Under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, please provide the following information for the most recent full financial year available:
1. The total number of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests handled.
2. The number of full-time equivalent (FTE) and part-time employees involved in handling FOI requests.
3. The names of any software systems or tools used by the FOI team to manage or track requests.
4. The total annual cost of those software systems.
5. Any statistics or recorded information showing the average, median, and (if available) upper-quartile time spent per FOI request.
6. The total salary cost of each employee (or, if easier, the total salary expenditure for all FOI-handling staff).
7. Copies of any internal communications, reports, or evaluations discussing the cost or effectiveness of FOI handling.
8. Confirmation of whether the system used for FOI handling is also used for Subject Access Requests, complaints, or any other casework.

Response

 

1. 2024/25
Data Protection requests = 45
Environmental Information Regulation (EIR) requests = 80
Environmental Information Regulation Property Search requests (EIR/PS) = 609
Freedom of Information (FOI) requests = 730
Subject Access requests (SAR) = 76
2. 
1 x FTE employee =  logging and responding to the above requests (except EIR/PS) 
1 x Part time Admin support (hours not logged) for logging and responding to Property Search EIR requests
3. Meritec ESB is used to log the above requests
4. Information not held
Meritec is used widely by the council for other functions such as 
managing interactions with residents, service requests, and complaints and it
covers refuse collection, recycling, street cleaning, and environmental health. Therefore the cost cannot be broken down to just logging FOI requests.
5. This is not recorded so the information is not held
6. This information is exempt under section 40(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Section 40(2) exempts disclosure if it constitutes the personal data of which the applicant is not the data subject and a further condition is satisfied.  In this instance, the first condition listed in 40(3A)(a) is engaged: disclosure would contravene any of the data protection principles.  In this instance we are of the opinion that if the information in question were to be provided the Council would be in contravention of principle one, fair and lawful processing.  The individual has a right to privacy and we do not believe that the potential intrusion that this disclosure might bring would be compatible with this principle of fairness, or that there are any over-riding legitimate interests in the disclosure of this information.
Where this condition applies, the exemption is absolute and does not require the public interest test to be considered.  
Therefore, in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act this email acts as a Refusal Notice for this question.
7. Information Not held
8. Yes the system is used to log complaints and Subject Access requests.  See Q1.