Pecs Payment Plan

Question

I would like any and all information that relates to a project called Pecs Payment Plan, it is also known as CN1105 also with various Amendments, it also known as Instalment plan, Installment Plan, Pecs Instalment Plan, pecs installment plan.

This includes e-mails, printed documents, electronic documents, hand written information. Especially those that are received by NSS from SOPRASTERIA also known as just SOPRA

Response

I can confirm that Practitioner and Counter Fraud Services (P&CFS) does hold information that falls within the description specified in your request.  However, P&CFS estimate that the cost of undertaking the necessary search, retrieval and preparatory work that will enable us to respond to your request exceeds the fees limit as set out in the Freedom of Information (Fees for Required Disclosure) (Scotland) Regulations 2004. 

Therefore, P&CFS are not obliged under Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act (Scotland) 2002 (FOISA) to provide a response.  For information purposes, the fee limit set down by the Scottish Ministers is £600.  We have estimated the cost involved to answer this request to be in excess of this fee limit.

P&CFS have identified 20 staff members who have been involved in the project(s) listed within your request.

Using your search criteria, it would take each staff member on average approximately four hours to retrieve all relevant emails and documents from their email boxes and respective filing systems.  The retrieval time takes into account reviewing for, and the removal of, duplicates, and also the removal of any unrelated correspondence.

NSS staff have no expectation that their personal information would be disclosed into the public domain.  Therefore, emails are redacted in line with Section 38(1)(b) “Personal Information” of the FOISA to remove all internal and external staff names and contact details.  This exemption is also subject to the Public Interest Test, and P&CFS have assessed that there is no interest to the public in disclosing staff names and contact details as P&CFS recognises its obligation to protect personal information under current data protection legislation. 

The Fees Regulation staff cost cap of £15.00 per hour has been applied to all 20 staff, as they would be required to retrieve their individual copies of digital correspondence from their individual NHS email accounts and filing systems.  No single member of staff can search all staff email accounts.

The total retrieval and redaction cost for 20 members of staff can therefore be calculated as:

4 hours x £15 per hour x 20 members of staff = £1,200

The FOISA gives everyone the right to ask Scottish public authorities for information.  The FOISA gives the right to information, not documents.  Please note under Section 8(1)(c) of the FOISA the requester must describe the information that they require.  The purpose of this allows public authorities to identify and locate the information requested.  Your request specifically mentions categories of documents which you are not entitled to request under the legislation.  You may wish to reconsider this if you decide to submit a new request.

If you wish to make a new request for information I would be happy to discuss with you the specific project information that you require and advise if the request could be fulfilled within the cost limit.