The Act does not require charges to be made, but public authorities have discretion
to charge a fee in accordance with Fees Regulations made under sections 9, 12 and 13 of the Act. As
a general rule the applicant will not be expected to pay a charge for any reasonable requests for information
held by Roads Service. However, Roads Service reserves the eight to charge the full cost of disbursements
(photocopying, printing and posting).
If it would cost more than £600 for a
public authority to respond to a Freedom of Information request, then an authority need not comply with
it. The £600 limit covers the time taken to find, sort, edit or redact material. It does not cover the
time taken to consider whether an exemption applies and the public interest test.
