Disclosure Log
FOI - Pothole compensation (FOI/4517)
Message from Nottinghamshire County Council - 22 July 2024
Dear *****
Freedom of Information Request – Ref: FOI/00004517
Thank you for your email of 10 July 2024 where you requested:
I kindly request the following information:
- The number of motorists who have lodged a complaint about a pothole and requested compensation.
- The number of people who have received a payout for pothole compensation.
- The total amount paid by the council for pothole compensation.
From our preliminary assessment, it is clear that we will not be able to answer your request without further clarification. Under section 1(3) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA), a public authority need not comply with a request unless any further information reasonably required to locate the information is supplied. If a request is too broad or general in nature, then public authorities have a duty to provide advice and assistance to the applicant in order to focus the request.
In order to provide you with the information on the scale that you have requested would require us to manually review 205,027 highway related contacts that we have received. This is because our system does not allow us to filter highways related contacts that are a complaint about potholes and request compensation. We would therefore have to manually read each of the 205,027 contacts we have found in scope of your request for the time period June 2021 to May 2024.
Section 12 of the Act makes provision for public authorities to refuse requests for information where the cost of dealing with them would exceed the appropriate limit, which for local government is set at £450. This represents the estimated cost of one person spending 18 hours in determining whether the department holds the information, locating, retrieving and extracting the information.
We estimate that it will take us in excess of 18 hours to determine appropriate material and locate, retrieve and extract the information in reference to your request. Therefore, your request will not be processed further.
You may wish to refine your request by narrowing its scope by being more specific about what information you particularly wish to obtain, including any dates or period of time relevant to the information required. For the time periods you have requested we can answer how many claims for compensation we have received and the total number of people receiving compensation along with the amount paid. If you wish to resubmit your revised request for this information please let us know.
Your privacy: we use your personal information such as name and address so that we can comply with our legal obligations to respond to FOI requests. For further details about the use of information about you, please see the information handling privacy notice on our website at https://www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/media/4323566/informationgovernanceandinformationrightsprivacynotice.pdf.
If you are dissatisfied with the handling of your request, you have the right to ask for an internal review requests should be submitted within 40 working days of the date of receipt of the response to your original request and should be addressed to: Complaints and Information – Team Manager, Nottinghamshire County Council, County Hall, Loughborough Road, West Bridgford, NOTTINGHAM, NG2 7QP or [email protected].
Please remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications.
If you are not content with the outcome of the internal review, you have the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, WILMSLOW, SK9 5AF or https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/foi-and-eir-complaints/.
Yours sincerely
Andy Horner
Complaints & Information | Nottinghamshire County Council
Chief Executive Department | Nottinghamshire County Council
County Hall Loughborough Road West Bridgford Nottinghamshire NG2 7QP
* [email protected]
www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk
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