Freedom of information

Freedom of information

The Freedom of Information Act 2000 and Environmental Information Regulations 2004 give you the right to ask for information held by public authorities.

We publish a large amount of information on the website, which is readily available to view and download.

Before you start

We regularly publish information which may answer your enquiry.  We add to this regularly and also provide a disclosure log to publish responses to previous requests for information. 

Find information

Making a request

If you can't find the information that you're looking for online, you can submit a request for information (RFI). Please provide a full description of the information you require and be as specific as you can. If your request is too broad, we might ask you to clarify it which may delay you getting the information.

Submit a request online

You can also write in to us, but this may take longer to process.

Resident Experience Team,
Residents’ Services,
Hammersmith Town Hall W6 9JU

Or call us on 020 8753 2456 (9am to 5pm)

What we can't give you

We can refuse a request if:

  • it would cost too much or take too much staff time to deal with the request
  • the request is vexatious
  • the request repeats a previous request from the same person or group of people

The law also allows us to withhold certain types of information or information that will have a particular impact. These are known as ‘exemptions’ under FOI or ‘exceptions’ under EIR.

We will let you know if we’re withholding information for this reason. Some examples of when we may withhold information are:

  • it is another person’s personal data
  • the information is commercially sensitive and making it public could harm someone’s commercial interests
  • the information is already available via another route
  • making the information public could harm national security

What does it cost?

Nothing – access to information on our website or that we provide in response to your request is free.

If your request would take us over 18 hours or cost us more than £450 to respond to, then we’ll let you know within 20 days that we’re refusing to act on your request because responding would exceed the time or cost limits.

When you’ll get a response

We’ll respond within 20 working days unless your request is very complex, large or we need to consider the ‘public interest’ for giving you the information.

If it’s complex, large or we’re considering the public interest, it may take up to 40 working days to respond in full so we’ll let you know within 20 days when we expect to respond. We’ll keep you updated if the date changes.

Who to contact if you’re unhappy about our response

We’d like to try to put things right if you’re unhappy with our response. Please contact the Resident Experience Team within 40 working days of receiving our response and let us know:

  • the case reference number we gave you for your request – this helps us find your request quickly in our systems
  • the contact details we should use to contact you about your concerns, for example your full name and either your email address or postal address. Please let us know if these are different from the contact details you gave us for your request
  • why you’re unhappy, for example did we take too long to respond? do you think we haven’t done everything we should have – please give us examples if possible
  • any other information or documents you think will help us investigate your concerns.

Our Information Management Team will work with the relevant services to look at what we did and check we’ve done everything we should have.

We’ll respond within 20-40 working days of us receiving your concerns and getting any other information we’ve asked for to help us investigate them. We’ll keep you updated if the date changes.

If you’ve contacted us about your concerns and you’re still unhappy or you’d prefer to raise them with an independent party please contact the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

The ICO are the UK’s independent authority set up to uphold information rights in the public interest.

More information about the ICO is available on the ICO's website or by calling their helpline on 0303 123 1113.

You can complain to the ICO by:

Quicklinks