TfL Ref: 2133-1617
Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on1 February 2017 asking for information about the amount of money spent on pest control for 2014, 2015 and 2016 broken down per month and also asking for information on changes made to tube timetables published online.
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act and our information access policy. I can confirm we do hold some of the information you require.
Unfortunately, to provide all the information you have requested would exceed the ‘appropriate limit’ of £450 set by the Freedom of Information (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. This appropriate limit applies to both parts of your request.
Under section 12 of the FOI Act, we are not obliged to comply with a request if we estimate that the cost of determining whether we hold the information, locating and retrieving it and extracting it from other information would exceed the appropriate limit. This is calculated at £25 per hour for every hour spent on the activities described. We have estimated that it would exceed the appropriate limit to provide a response to your current request.
The definition of ‘pests’ is potentially wide and could include anything from vermin, insects to invasive plant species, injurious weeds or tree pathogens.
TfL comprises of several business operations, such as streets, buses, London Underground, TfL Rail, London Overground, Docklands Light Railway and Tramlink. It is not clear if your enquiry relates to one or all parts of the organisation.
TfL has several contracts that involve pest management in its different business areas. The method of apportioning pest control costs varies according to the contract type, for example in some cases there is a specific contracted service for this and in others, pest control is one element of a larger contract fee.
To collate the information for your request about pest control alone would exceed the appropriate limit.
To help bring the cost of responding to your request within the £450 limit, you may wish to consider narrowing its scope so that we can more easily locate, retrieve and extract the information you are seeking. For example, you may wish to limit the time period or the mode of transport you are requesting the pest control data for. Additionally, you may wish to request the information for timetable changes separately.
If you want to refine your request or make a Freedom of Information Act request in future, please bear in mind that the Freedom of Information Act allows you to request recorded information held by us. You should identify the information that you want as clearly and concisely as you can, specifying the types of document that you are looking for. You might also consider limiting your request to a particular period of time, geographical area or specific departments of the organisation.
Although your request can take the form of a question, rather than a request for specific documents, we do not have to answer your question if it would require the creation of new information or the provision of a judgement, explanation, advice or opinion that was not already recorded at the time of your request.
Please note that we will not be taking further action until we receive your revised request.
In the meantime, if you have any queries or would like to discuss your request, please do not hesitate to contact me.
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
Sara Thomas
FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London
