Freedom of Information Team
Globe House
7th Floor
89 Eccleston Square
London
SW1V 1PN
Email
: xxx@xxxx.xxx.xx
Website
: www.gov.uk/hm-passport-
office
Emai
l xxx@xxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Sam Smith
Websi
te www.gov.uk/hm-passport-
office
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx
Reference: FOICR 56251/19
19 November 2019
Dear Mr Smith
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST
Thank you for your email of 1 November in which you ask for information on the photo
checking service.
Your request has been handled as a request for information under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000 (FOIA).
1) any end reports or final outputs from each round of user research which covered
the photo checking service; (if no such reports or outputs were produced, please
provide whatever the user research staff produced to share with the rest of the
project team in 2019)
2) any Service Assessment from either HMPO, the Home Office, or the Government
Digital Service which covered the photo checking service (sensitive information that
does not relate to the checking service can be redacted from the documents - it is
the photo checking service that is of interest) prior to entering beta or live stages of
service
To limit the scope of this request, we only require documents produced since 1st
January 2019.
Under section 12(1) of the Act, Her Majesty’s Passport Office is not obliged to comply with
an information request where to do so would exceed the cost limit.
We hold the information which you have requested but we have estimated that the cost of
meeting your request would exceed the cost limit of £600 specified in the Freedom of
Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. We are
therefore unable to comply with it.
Passport Adviceline: 0300 222 0000
Email us at foi
@hmpo.gov.uk
Visit our website at www.gov.uk
The information you have requested is held in hundreds of different documents and
reports and it would require an extensive search of our records to obtain all the documents
that refer to the photo checking service. It would not be possible to check all the
documents in scope and extract the information you have requested within the cost limit.
The £600 limit is based on work being carried out at a rate of £25 per hour, which equates
to 24 hours of work per request. The cost of locating, retrieving and extracting information
can be included in the costs for these purposes. The costs do not include considering
whether any information is exempt from disclosure, overheads such as heating or lighting,
or items such as photocopying or postage.
If you refine your request, so that it is more likely to fall under the cost limit, we will
consider it again. Due to the nature of your enquiry it is not possible to provide you with
advice on how you may refine your request to fall within the cost limit.
Please note that if you simply break your request down into a series of similar smaller
requests, we might still decline to answer it if the total cost exceeds £600.
If you are dissatisfied with this response you may request an independent internal review
of our handling of your request by submitting a complaint within two months to
xxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxx.xxx.xx, quoting reference 56251. If you ask for an internal review,
it would be helpful if you could say why you are dissatisfied with the response.
As part of any internal review the Department's handling of your information request would
be reassessed by staff who were not involved in providing you with this response. If you
were to remain dissatisfied after an internal review, you would have a right of complaint to
the Information Commissioner as established by section 50 of the FOIA.
Yours sincerely
D Hjiej-Andaloussi
Freedom of Information Team
Passport Adviceline: 0300 222 0000
Email us at foi
@hmpo.gov.uk
Visit our website at www.gov.uk