F/on from FOI-0750 - Please supply all correspondence, including emails and the logging of complaints/problems, in the first week of Nov 2017, relating to customer refunds where a customer has used the contactless payment method on all forms of TFL travel. Please include 'contactless' and 'refund' as key words in your search of the archives.

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Our ref: FOI-1331-1819/GH 

 Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 13 August 2018 asking for copies of correspondence about Contactless Payment Card (CPC) refunds.

 

 

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy. I can confirm we do hold the information you require.

We are refusing your request under section 14(1) of the Act, as we consider that providing the requested information would place an unreasonable burden on us. Our principal duty is to provide an effective transport service for London and we consider that answering this request would represent a disproportionate effort. It would be a significant distraction from our work managing the TfL network, requiring re-allocation of already limited resources and placing an unacceptable burden on a small number of personnel. We do wish to clarify that whilst we consider that your request falls under section 14(1) of the FOI Act, this does not reflect a conclusion that it has been your intention to deliberately place an undue burden on our resources.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) guidance states that one of the indicators of a request which may fall under section 14(1) is that it “appears to be part of a completely random approach, lacks any clear focus, or seems to have been solely designed for the purpose of ‘fishing’ for information without any idea of what might be revealed.”

The ICO guidance provides the following examples of a ‘fishing expedition’ request which may fall under section 14(1) if it:

- Imposes a burden by obliging the authority to sift through a substantial volume of information to isolate and extract the relevant details;

- Encompasses information which is only of limited value because of the wide scope of the request;

- Creates a burden by requiring the authority to spend a considerable amount of time considering any exemptions and redactions.

Our view is that all three of these examples apply in this instance. Identifying and collating any emails identified which contain such broad and frequently used words as ‘contactless’ and ‘refund’ would be a significant task. By its nature, we feel this wide ranging and non-specific request will very likely encompass information which is only of limited value.

Whilst you have refined your request to a shorter time frame, we consider the burden of retrieving, reviewing and redacting the information would be disproportionate to the benefit of providing it, and therefore we are refusing it under s.14 of the FOI Act. If you would like to re-submit a more focused, specific request then we will, of course, consider it. If you have a complaint or a problem regarding a refund, we have more appropriate channels for your concerns to be investigated.

If you are not satisfied with this response please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.

Yours sincerely

Graham Hurt

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

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