Section 12 - Excessive cost of compliance

What this refusal means#

The authority is saying that it would cost more than £600 to find and retrieve the information you asked for. This is a cost limit set by regulations - it’s based on staff time at £15 per hour, which means the authority is claiming it would take more than 40 hours of work to locate, retrieve and provide the information.

This is not an exemption - it’s a procedural refusal. There is no public interest test. But the authority cannot simply say “too expensive” and walk away. It has specific duties even when refusing on cost grounds.

What the authority must show#

For a section 12 refusal to be valid, the authority must:

1. Estimate the cost - it must have worked out that the cost of compliance would exceed the £600 upper limit
2. Only count certain activities - the estimate can only include the cost of locating, retrieving and providing the information, not the cost of considering exemptions or redacting
3. Offer advice and assistance - under section 15 of FOISA, the authority has a duty to help you reformulate your request so you can get some or all of what you want within the cost limit
4. Consider whether it can provide the information anyway - section 12 gives a discretion to refuse, not a duty to refuse

Things to check#

• Did they provide a cost estimate? The authority should explain how it calculated the cost. A bare assertion that the cost would be excessive is not enough - you need to be able to assess whether the estimate is reasonable.

• Is the estimate reasonable? Consider whether the authority has overstated the work involved. For example, if the information is held in a well-organised electronic system, it shouldn’t take 40 hours to find it. If the estimate includes activities that don’t count (like considering exemptions), it’s inflated.

• Did they offer to help you narrow the request? The duty to advise and assist is important. The authority should suggest ways to bring the request within the cost limit - for example, by limiting the time period, focusing on specific departments, or asking for a summary rather than raw data.

• Did they offer any alternatives? Even if your full request is too costly, the authority might be able to provide part of the information, or similar information that’s easier to retrieve.

• Could you reformulate the request? Sometimes a small change to a request can make a big difference to the cost. Consider whether you could narrow what you’re asking for while still getting what you need.

Use the interactive tool#

Answer the questions below to check whether section 12 has been properly applied to your request.