Regulation 10(4)(c): Request too general

When a request for environmental information is refused because it is formulated in too general a manner.

Request too general#

Regulation 10(4)(c) of the EIR(S) allows an authority to refuse your request if it is formulated in too general a manner. But there’s a catch: the authority can only use this exception if it has first asked you to clarify your request and helped you do so. If it hasn’t, the exception doesn’t apply.

In plain terms#

The authority is saying it can’t work out what you’re asking for. Your request is too vague, unclear, or non-specific for the authority to identify the information you want. Before it can refuse, it must contact you and try to sort out the confusion.

You email a council asking for “all information about pollution.” The council doesn’t know whether you mean air pollution, water pollution, noise, a specific location, a specific time period, or something else. It contacts you and asks you to narrow the request. You explain you want air quality monitoring results for a particular industrial estate over the past two years. The council now has a clear request and must deal with it - the exception falls away.

The legal detail#

Regulation 10(4)(c) applies where the request is formulated in too general a manner and the authority has complied with its duty under regulation 9. Regulation 9 imposes two specific obligations:

The authority must ask you, as soon as possible and no later than 20 working days after receiving your request, to provide more particulars
The authority must assist you in providing those particulars

Both steps are required. If the authority hasn’t asked you to clarify, or hasn’t helped you do so, it cannot rely on this exception.

This is a class exception. It turns on the clarity of the request, not on the content of the information.

The public interest test#

Like all EIR(S) exceptions, this one is subject to the public interest test. In practice, if the authority genuinely cannot identify what information is being requested, the public interest in maintaining the exception is likely to outweigh the interest in disclosure - because disclosing the wrong information serves nobody.

The authority must still interpret the exception restrictively and apply the presumption in favour of disclosure. See What can they refuse? for more on the public interest test under the EIR(S).

How it’s used in practice#

“Too general” means vague or unclear. It does not mean broad. A request that covers a large amount of information is not automatically too general. If the authority can identify what falls within the scope of the request, the request is not too general - even if responding to it would take significant time. A broad request might instead be manifestly unreasonable under regulation 10(4)(b), but that is a different exception with a different test.

The Commissioner found this distinction in Decision 261/2014, where Scottish Ministers refused a request about bird populations as “too general.” The Commissioner disagreed - the request was broad, not unclear. The Ministers could identify the information it covered. The Commissioner also found that the Ministers had failed to give adequate advice and assistance, which meant they could not rely on the exception in any case.

Requesters should not be expected to know an authority’s file reference numbers, internal structures, or technical terminology. The Section 60 Code of Practice makes clear that the duty to help includes explaining what kinds of information the authority holds, providing access to catalogues and indexes, and discussing the request with you directly.

If you clarify your request following the authority’s advice, the clarified version is treated as a new request. The 20-working-day response clock starts from the date of your clarification, not from the original request.

How to challenge it#

Did they actually ask you to clarify? If the authority refused without first contacting you and helping you narrow the request, the exception cannot apply. Point this out in your review request - it is a procedural failure.

Was your request genuinely unclear? If the authority could reasonably identify the information covered by your request, the exception doesn’t hold. A request doesn’t need to be perfectly worded. It needs to be clear enough for the authority to know what you’re asking for.

Did you clarify and get refused anyway? If you responded to the authority’s request for clarification and explained what you wanted, but the authority still refused under 10(4)(c), challenge whether your clarification left genuine ambiguity. If not, the exception should no longer apply.

See What to do if refused for the full process.

You can also use our interactive challenge tool for this exception to work through these questions step by step and draft a review request.

Good to know: Under FOISA, there is no equivalent exemption for unclear requests. If a FOISA request is genuinely unintelligible, it may not count as a valid request at all. The EIR(S) approach is different - the request is valid, but the authority can refuse it after trying to help you clarify. This reflects the EIR(S) principle that requests can be made verbally, which makes vagueness more likely and advice and assistance more important.