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Fees for FOIA Requests

Both FOIA and FCA regulations (at 12 C.F.R. § 602.12) authorize FCA to recover the direct costs of providing information to a FOIA requester. The total fee depends on the identity of the requester, the purpose of the request, and the services required to respond to the request. Requests are classified as follows:

Commercial use request: A request for information to further the commercial, trade, or profit interests of the requester. To determine whether a request is properly classified as commercial use, FCA will determine the purpose for the documents requested.

Educational institution request: A request for information from a preschool, a public or private elementary or secondary school, an institution of undergraduate or graduate higher education, an institution of professional education, or an institution of vocational education that runs a program of scholarly research.

Noncommercial scientific institution request: A request for information from an institution that conducts scientific research that is not intended to promote any particular product or industry.

News media request: A request for information from any person actively gathering news for an entity that publishes or broadcasts news to the public. Examples of news media include television or radio stations and periodical publishers that sell their products.

Other: A request from anyone not in the above categories. These requesters are charged the direct cost of search and reproduction, except that the first two hours of search time and the first 100 pages of duplication are free. After the first two hours of search time, we will charge for search costs even if no records are disclosed.

* You are responsible for fees even if we do not disclose any records.

Fee Waiver
If you are seeking information to advance public understanding of the Federal Government’s operations or activities and the information mostly will not be used in your own commercial interest, we may waive or reduce fees. You will not be required to pay when total fees are less than $15.

Fee Payment
When we estimate that fees will be more than $25 and you have told us that you will pay fees up to a certain amount, we will process the request so that the fees do not exceed the agreed-upon amount. If you did not tell us in advance that you will pay estimated fees, we will tell you the amount of the estimated fees and ask that you agree to pay. We will begin processing your FOIA request when we receive your agreement to pay.

If estimated fees exceed $250 and you have a history of paying fees, we may respond to your request based on your agreement to pay. However, if the estimated fees exceed $250 and you have no history of paying fees, we may require you to pay in advance.

If you previously failed to pay fees for information requests or if you paid them late, you must pay any fees still owed plus interest (or show that they were paid) before we will respond to a new or pending request. If fees were unpaid or paid late, you may be required to pay in advance the estimated fees for the new request, as well as interest on the unpaid fees.