Freedom of Information request

[Achandler]

I looked at the FOI again, I don't work in a school but I have done. The requestor is clearly intent on getting the information no matter what cost to the public as a whole.

 

Given the above it is likely motivated for a reason that we won't understand, if bmaloney is the requester then he hasn't given any offered up any reason, so the rest is an assumption, based on the facts he has provided.

 

I hope this research takes into account the bias of court ruling, if more men or women die young or any other variation, maybe the male parents haven't given details because they don't want contacting, maybe the school didn't collect them. Same with male/ female staff ratio, if you advertise jobs and everyone who applies is female then you are likely to appoint a female... This doesn't mean that schools are inherititly bias in one way or another.

 

I am imagining the aim of the research is to to prove that schools don't have enough father's contacts details, and they haven't tried hard enough to contact them... This will then be backed up by the fact the schools have more female staff then male staff (my experience in general), so there must be an unconcious bias against males and the importance of a male role figure in their life.

[witch]

AFAIK we haven't had one either

I'm not sure whether you understand how junk mail works in a school. Schools get many many emails headed "Freedom of Information Request" or similar which are often companies trying to sell solutions or forms or something or other to supposedly help schools with genuine requests. If we didnt have robust junk mail directives, the school would be snowed under by such stuff. It is indeed a shame if your emails go astray - perhaps you could come up with a different title?

 

Are schools charging you for FOI requests? I absolutely believe that FOI is a good thing but I also know how much time they can take which detracts from the work a school must do every day. Recouping at least a bit of money could help. You are very very lucky if schools have chosen not to charge you - and I would like to see a bit less of a slightly sneery attitude from you and a bit more acknowledgement that many schools are doing their best to comply and NOT hitting your pocket - which they are entitled to do.

[elsiegee40]

AFAIK we haven't had one either

I'm not sure whether you understand how junk mail works in a school. Schools get many many emails headed "Freedom of Information Request" or similar which are often companies trying to sell solutions or forms or something or other to supposedly help schools with genuine requests. If we didnt have robust junk mail directives, the school would be snowed under by such stuff. It is indeed a shame if your emails go astray - perhaps you could come up with a different title?

 

Are schools charging you for FOI requests? I absolutely believe that FOI is a good thing but I also know how much time they can take which detracts from the work a school must do every day. Recouping at least a bit of money could help. You are very very lucky if schools have chosen not to charge you - and I would like to see a bit less of a slightly sneery attitude from you and a bit more acknowledgement that many schools are doing their best to comply and NOT hitting your pocket - which they are entitled to do.

 

You are not allowed to charge for fulfilling a FoI request. A printing, copying and postage charge of £10 is all that’s allowed... and this one is electronic.

[djrscally]

AFAIK we haven't had one either

I'm not sure whether you understand how junk mail works in a school. Schools get many many emails headed "Freedom of Information Request" or similar which are often companies trying to sell solutions or forms or something or other to supposedly help schools with genuine requests. If we didnt have robust junk mail directives, the school would be snowed under by such stuff. It is indeed a shame if your emails go astray - perhaps you could come up with a different title?

 

Are schools charging you for FOI requests? I absolutely believe that FOI is a good thing but I also know how much time they can take which detracts from the work a school must do every day. Recouping at least a bit of money could help. You are very very lucky if schools have chosen not to charge you - and I would like to see a bit less of a slightly sneery attitude from you and a bit more acknowledgement that many schools are doing their best to comply and NOT hitting your pocket - which they are entitled to do.

 

Can't really have mail filters that block FOI requests. If anything you should white-list them. If someone reports you for not responding and your excuse to the ICO is "Well our mail system blocks those" you're gonna get a smacked hand.

[sparkeh]

You are not allowed to charge for fulfilling a FoI request. A printing, copying and postage charge of £10 is all that’s allowed... and this one is electronic.

Has something changed since ICO issued this: https://ico.org.uk/media/1635/fees_cost_of_compliance_exceeds_appropriate_limit.pdf

The example given is of charging £850 to supply information under the act.

This is of course if the reasonable limit is exceeded which probably does not apply in this case, but still, its not as clear cut as you can't charge.

Edited March 19, 2018 by sparkeh

[witch]

I was thinking more of this: "Staff time

A public authority can charge for the time taken by its staff on the

activities included in communicating the information.

Regulation 7(5) indicates that staff time is to be charged at the flat

rate of £25 per hour, irrespective of whether a higher rate is

actually incurred by internal staff or charged by external contractor

staff.

A public authority can also charge for the time it takes a member of

staff to actually redact the exempt information. This cost can be

included because it is part of the costs of communicating the

information under regulation 7. Regulation 7(5) of the Fees

Regulations confirms that a public authority can only charge £25 per

hour for this activity. For example, if it takes one employee 45

minutes to black out the information which is not to be disclosed

then the public authority can charge £18.75 for this activity. "

 

I would have said that "activities including in communicating the information" includes actually spending the time to dig out the relevant info in the first place

 

As for the junk mail issue - you are right, schools need to think about things like this.

Edited March 19, 2018 by witch

[DGardiner]

Can't really have mail filters that block FOI requests. If anything you should white-list them. If someone reports you for not responding and your excuse to the ICO is "Well our mail system blocks those" you're gonna get a smacked hand.

 

and how do you even not block them? if google apps deems it spam its in admin quarantine, no spam is delivered to the end users here. i for one am not handing out a *foi* subject/body free pass through the spam filter?

Edited March 19, 2018 by DGardiner

[elsiegee40]

I was thinking more of this: "Staff time

A public authority can charge for the time taken by its staff on the

activities included in communicating the information.

Regulation 7(5) indicates that staff time is to be charged at the flat

rate of £25 per hour, irrespective of whether a higher rate is

actually incurred by internal staff or charged by external contractor

staff.

A public authority can also charge for the time it takes a member of

staff to actually redact the exempt information. This cost can be

included because it is part of the costs of communicating the

information under regulation 7. Regulation 7(5) of the Fees

Regulations confirms that a public authority can only charge £25 per

hour for this activity. For example, if it takes one employee 45

minutes to black out the information which is not to be disclosed

then the public authority can charge £18.75 for this activity. "

 

I would have said that "activities including in communicating the information" includes actually spending the time to dig out the relevant info in the first place

 

As for the junk mail issue - you are right, schools need to think about things like this.

ICO Code of Practice

 

If the request will cost the school less than £450, as calculated at £25 per hour (ie 18 hours) no charge may be made apart from the communications charge of £10 (not justified in this case) ICO linky

 

If it will cost more than £450, the school has the right to refuse the request ICO linky

Edited March 19, 2018 by elsiegee40

[djrscally]

and how do you even not block them? if google apps deems it spam its in admin quarantine, no spam is delivered to the end users here. i for one am not handing out a *foi* subject/body free pass through the spam filter?

 

Well not a total free pass through, but if your email is filtering out legit FoI requests on the grounds they're just spam, I'd say that's a problem. You still have to reply to those.

[DGardiner]

Well not a total free pass through, but if your email is filtering out legit FoI requests on the grounds they're just spam, I'd say that's a problem. You still have to reply to those.

 

weve never had any blocked thus far, just curious

[Mako]

and how do you even not block them? if google apps deems it spam its in admin quarantine, no spam is delivered to the end users here. i for one am not handing out a *foi* subject/body free pass through the spam filter?

 

In Office 365 you would create an organisation spam bypass rule, most likely allowing any mail with "FOI" or "Freedom of Information" text matches. Not sure about Google Apps, we don't use it.

[DJ-1701]

Well not a total free pass through, but if your email is filtering out legit FoI requests on the grounds they're just spam, I'd say that's a problem. You still have to reply to those.

 

Depending on the system, it could be impossible if it got auto deleted (say the filtering detected what it believed to be, right or wrong, a risky/malformed url in the body of the e-mail) or even the account it was sent to no longer existing (generally a lot of systems gave bounce backs to the original sender now, but not all... then again I don't know if they would auto bounce back to a noreply@ address...). Even in the physical world there are problems with mail service failing to deliver something.

[bmaloney]

So if I make a FOI request to all schools I have contact details for asking them to respond to confirm their contact email address for the purpose of FOI requests, I could then follow up with any that don't respond. If the email address I've used is the one they publish, I can take them to the ICO for ignoring the request. That should sort out the issue of whether or not you can filter out and ignore requests by email shouldn't it?

[Garacesh]

So if I make a FOI request to all schools I have contact details for asking them to respond to confirm their contact email address for the purpose of FOI requests, I could then follow up with any that don't respond. If the email address I've used is the one they publish, I can take them to the ICO for ignoring the request. That should sort out the issue of whether or not you can filter out and ignore requests by email shouldn't it?

 

Schools can and reasonably frequently (in the grand scheme of things, not individually) change domains. For example, in recent years a lot of schools have opted to drop the .county.sch.uk in favour of something easier like .uk or .com, plus there's a lot of schools that will have changed domains due to becoming an academy or joining a MAT. It's probable, I'd go as far as to say guaranteed, that the contact information you have is outdated and that a percentage of schools you emailed legitimately did not receive your request. Not that I want to encourage spam, but you could consider checking the emails you have on file against the school website which IIRC legally must list an email address for the head and a few others? (Please correct me if I'm wrong)

 

FOI'ing schools to obtain contact information is a bit of a waste of time - both yours and anyone else's. Either you're using your mass-list you already have which obviously won't reach the ones you don't have correct addresses for, so they can't reply to correct you in the first place, or you start checking websites to find out email addresses, in which case there's no need to email them to ask.

Edited March 19, 2018 by Garacesh

[djrscally]

Depending on the system, it could be impossible if it got auto deleted (say the filtering detected what it believed to be, right or wrong, a risky/malformed url in the body of the e-mail) or even the account it was sent to no longer existing (generally a lot of systems gave bounce backs to the original sender now, but not all... then again I don't know if they would auto bounce back to a noreply@ address...). Even in the physical world there are problems with mail service failing to deliver something.

 

True although you wouldn't expect it to be common. I wonder if the ICO has ruled on this before somewhere.

[hardtailstar]

So if I make a FOI request to all schools I have contact details for asking them to respond to confirm their contact email address for the purpose of FOI requests, I could then follow up with any that don't respond. If the email address I've used is the one they publish, I can take them to the ICO for ignoring the request. That should sort out the issue of whether or not you can filter out and ignore requests by email shouldn't it?

 

And in turn making more work for you and schools.

 

@bmaloney Out of interest, are you keeping this FOI going until you get a response from all schools contacted?

[synaesthesia]

Wow, just had this request through. Certainly thorough. Wonder who on earth here is going to have the time to answer all those questions with other far more important things to do....

[mavhc]

What if you want to know the specific information about EVERY school? Using a limited sample won't get you the responses from every school.

 

Why would you want the information from every school? What would you do with it?

[bmaloney]

Schools can and reasonably frequently (in the grand scheme of things, not individually) change domains. For example, in recent years a lot of schools have opted to drop the .county.sch.uk in favour of something easier like .uk or .com, plus there's a lot of schools that will have changed domains due to becoming an academy or joining a MAT. It's probable, I'd go as far as to say guaranteed, that the contact information you have is outdated and that a percentage of schools you emailed legitimately did not receive your request. Not that I want to encourage spam, but you could consider checking the emails you have on file against the school website which IIRC legally must list an email address for the head and a few others? (Please correct me if I'm wrong)

 

FOI'ing schools to obtain contact information is a bit of a waste of time - both yours and anyone else's. Either you're using your mass-list you already have which obviously won't reach the ones you don't have correct addresses for, so they can't reply to correct you in the first place, or you start checking websites to find out email addresses, in which case there's no need to email them to ask.

Perhaps you mis-read my post, I said: "If the email address I've used is the one they publish"

[Garacesh]

Perhaps you mis-read my post, I said: "If the email address I've used is the one they publish"

 

If the e-mail address you've used is the one they publish, I don't understand why you would want to FOI them for contact details. You already have contact details.

 

If you FOI a school to confirm their contact details are correct and they are, you've wasted their time and yours.

If you FOI a school to confirm their contact details are correct and they aren't, they won't receive the request in the first place.

 

It doesn't achieve anything, and you're just wasting more time (thus, money)

Edited March 19, 2018 by Garacesh

[bmaloney]

If the e-mail address you've used is the one they publish, I don't understand why you would want to FOI them for contact details. You already have contact details.

 

If you FOI a school to confirm their contact details are correct and they are, you've wasted their time and yours.

If you FOI a school to confirm their contact details are correct and they aren't, they won't receive the request in the first place.

 

It doesn't achieve anything, and you're just wasting more time (thus, money)

 

The purpose is to detect SPAM filtering of FOI requests received by email. If a school is discarding FOI requests received by email without even looking at them, they are failing to comply with their duty under the FOIA. Public Authorities can't hide behind a SPAM filter and say "we never received that", they have to check their SPAM for valid requests.

[synaesthesia]

I don't think that'd hold up in court. In fact, I'd put money on it. If you've EVER seen the inbox of a head teacher or bursar in any school whether it's primary or secondary, you will understand why. Argue what you like, making it their responsibility to look for a needle in a haystack isn't acceptable.

[hardtailstar]

I don't think that'd hold up in court. In fact, I'd put money on it. If you've EVER seen the inbox of a head teacher or bursar in any school whether it's primary or secondary, you will understand why. Argue what you like, making it their responsibility to look for a needle in a haystack isn't acceptable.

 

Or anyone with a job title as an email, my last school I worked in my email was [email protected]

 

I was getting loads of emails randomly about anything and everything.

[DJ-1701]

The purpose is to detect SPAM filtering of FOI requests received by email. If a school is discarding FOI requests received by email without even looking at them, they are failing to comply with their duty under the FOIA. Public Authorities can't hide behind a SPAM filter and say "we never received that", they have to check their SPAM for valid requests.

 

But no sane person would be deliberately filtering for words 'FOI' or 'Freedom of Information' for deletion, that would just be idiotic. Only thing would be automation for malware *may* delete the e-mail if it believed there was a risk. Though this would usually require a url or attachment that the e-mail system found was potentially unsafe.

[enjay]

Or anyone with a job title as an email, my last school I worked in my email was [email protected]

 

I was getting loads of emails randomly about anything and everything.

 

We have headteacher@ You wouldn't believe the amount of junk that receives every day! Which is why the HT doesn't read it, their PA checks it and forwards to relevant staff as necessary (which is about 1% of the time!)