Dear Mr Chait,

Your request has been passed onto the council’s Revenues & Benefits section and they will respond to you direct. The request will be answered as part of our business as usual process and you will receive a response within 20 working days.

A business as usual request refers to a request that can be done in the normal course of business and does not require a formal FOI response. The Information Commissioner guidance on FOIA recognizes this type of request.

https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisatio... (p.18)

You retain your right to an internal review as well as your right of appeal to the Information Commissioner at: Telephone: 01625 545 745 Email: [email address]

If you have any questions, please contact: The Information Management Team Tel: 03000 268035 Email: [Durham County Council request email]

Regards,

The Information Management Team
Durham County Council

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Our new reference number: IR20175582GC

Dear Mr Chait,

Following your email below, we will now carry out an Internal Review for the above request. To allow us to track your internal review more easily and provide a timely response, we have logged it under a new reference number, as above. A response from the review will be provided within 20 working days or no later than 40 working days in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

The case officer dealing with your request is:

Christine Paciorek Tel. 03000 268036

Yours sincerely,

The Information Management Team
Durham County Council

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Dear Mr Chait,

Apologies for the delay in the response please find attached the
information that you requested.

Many Thanks

Andrew G Gray

Team Leader (Payments Income & Support)
Financial Support Services
Durham County Council

Tel:             03000 267513

e-mail:       [1][email address]

[2]cid:image001.gif@01CF2CFC.F13225D0

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Dear Durham County Council,

In terms of the Freedom of Information Act of 2000, and subject to section
40(2) on excluding personal data, could you please provide me with a
complete and up-to-date list of all business (non-residential) property
rates data for your local authority, and including the following fields:

- Billing Authority Reference Code (linking the property to the VOA
database reference)

- Firm's Trading Name (i.e. property occupant)

- Full Property Address (Number, Street, Postal Code, Town)

- Occupied / Vacant

- Date of Occupation / Vacancy

- Actual annual rates charged (in Pounds)

If you are unable to provide an absolute “Occupation / Vacancy” status,
please provide the Exemptions and / or Reliefs that a particular property
may be receiving.

We recognise that you ordinarily refuse to release these data in terms of
Regulation 31(1)(a). In November 2016, we appealed this class of refusal -
specifically as it relates to this request - to the Information
Commissioner’s Office and they issued a Decision Notice (FS50628943 -
[3]https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-tak...,
and FS50628978 -
[4]https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-tak...)
on 28 February 2017 finding that “it is not correct to withhold this
information under Regulation 31(1)(a)”, and that “the public interest in
the information being disclosed outweighs that in the exemption being
maintained”.

Note that these Decision Notices supersede Voyias v Information
Commissioner and London Borough of Camden Council (EA/2011/0007) and
Decision Notice FS50538789 (related to Stoke on Trent Council).

Please provide this as machine-readable as either a CSV or Microsoft Excel
file, capable of re-use, and under terms of the Open Government Licence.

I'm sure you get many requests for business rates and we intend to update
this national series every three months. Could we request that - as more
than 30% of local authorities already do - you update and release this
dataset via a dedicated page on your local authority website or on an open
data service. You should find that this reduces the time and cost of this
request process.

Yours faithfully,

Gavin Chait

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Please use this email address for all replies to this request:

[5][FOI #398189 email]

Is [6][Durham County Council request email] the wrong address for Freedom of Information
requests to Durham County Council? If so, please contact us using this
form:

[7]https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/change_re...

Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be published on
the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:

[8]https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/offi...

For more detailed guidance on safely disclosing information, read the
latest advice from the ICO:

[9]https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/ico-...

If you find this service useful as an FOI officer, please ask your web
manager to link to us from your organisation's FOI page.

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Dear Mr Chait

Business as Usual request BAU2017408GC – request for Internal Review
IR20175582GC

Thank you for your request for an internal review of your Business as
Usual request.  Please see our response attached.

Yours sincerely

Christine Paciorek BA(Hons) PC foi and dp

Freedom of Information and Data Protection Officer 

Transformation and Partnerships

Durham County Council

County Hall

Durham

DH1 5UF

Telephone 03000 268036

Switchboard 03000 26 0000

[1]www.durham.gov.uk

Follow us on Twitter @durhamcouncil

Like us at facebook.com/durhamcouncil

Follow us on linkedin.com/company/durham-county-council

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