Request ID: FOI-1806-2122 Date published: 21 December 2021
You asked
I am writing to request the following information under the freedom of information act.
Please could you provide the figure for the volume in litres and total price paid for liquid hand sanitiser at each of the tube, overground or rail stations owned or managed by Network Rail for the calendar years and periods (2018-2019, 2019-2020, 2020-2021 and Jan - Sept 2021)?
Clarification: Apologies for the confusion, the request should have been for the stations not managed by Network Rail, i.e the stations which Transport for London has responsibility for.
In order to narrow down the scope of the request would it be possible to focus on the 20 largest stations by entries/exits that TFL are responsible for? I have used the available data for 18-19 to select the stations below.
Best regards,
Station Name Region Station Facility Owner 1819 Entries & Exits
Stratford (London) London TfL Rail 41,206,226
Highbury & Islington London London Underground 30,439,574
Canada Water London London Underground 23,725,794
Farringdon London London Underground 15,087,488
Whitechapel London London Underground 14,412,690
West Ham London London Underground 10,717,126
Moorgate London London Underground 11,508,936
Old Street London London Underground 7,119,730
Romford London TfL Rail 9,180,976
Shoreditch High Street London London Overground 9,374,284
Seven Sisters London London Overground 8,394,772
Ilford London TfL Rail 7,942,174
Shepherd's Bush London London Overground 7,955,106
Ealing Broadway London TfL Rail 6,554,818
Willesden Junction London London Overground 5,943,590
Dalston Junction London London Overground 5,888,846
Forest Hill London London Overground 5,291,880
West Croydon London London Overground 5,419,354
Homerton London London Overground 4,931,672
Camden Road London London Overground 4,968,410
We answered
TfL Ref: FOI-1806-2122
Thank you for your request of 10th November 2021 and subsequent clarification email of 24th November 2021.
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy.
In respect of the twenty busiest TfL managed stations you asked:
“Please could you provide the figure for the volume in litres and total price paid for liquid hand sanitiser for the calendar years and periods (2018-2019, 2019-2020, 2020-2021 and Jan - Sept 2021)?”.
I am afraid that the exact information requested has not been collated on a station by station basis before and to do so would exceed the costs limit for responding to FOI cases as set out under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act. Under section 12 TfL is not required to provide information if it would cost more than £450 to determine if the requested information is held, and to then locate, retrieve or extract that information from elsewhere. This is calculated at a rate of £25 per hour, equivalent to 18 hours work.
However, that said, I am able to provide some related information as follows. On Tfl Rail the operator, MTR, bulk ordered hand sanitiser product and have sent approximately 500L to Taplow station on the West and Brentwood station on the East. These stations function as ‘hubs’ for the wider route and the sanitiser stations across the east and west network are checked by their contractors and filled up as required. MTR paid £9 a litre at the beginning of the pandemic (from May 2020) which was later negotiated down to £6.40 per litre. MTR’s last order was in March 2021. Figures are not available for previous years as hand sanitiser was not required prior to the pandemic. Since December 2020 sanitiser has been provided free by Dettol under a sponsorship arrangement.
Separately, I can provide you with the attached “sanitiser tracker” spreadsheet which has been provided by our London Underground cleaning provider, ABM, which provides some related information for various LU stations and some other services. There were no sanitiser stations prior to the pandemic. TfL was supplied with sanitiser at a cost of £3.40 a litre prior to this being supplied by Dettol for free under the sponsorship arrangement of December 2020.
Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal as well as information on copyright and what to do if you would like to re-use any of the information we have disclosed.
Yours sincerely,
David Wells FOI Case Officer FOI Case Management Team General Counsel Transport for London
