§ 2702.8 - Categories of requesters and applicable fees.

§ 2702.8 Advance payment Categories of fees; interest; debt collection proceduresrequesters and applicable fees.

(a) Advance payment of fees generally will not be required. However, an advance payment (before work is commenced or continued on a request) may be required if the charges are likely to exceed $250.

(b) Requesters who have previously failed to pay a fee charged in timely fashion (i.e., within 30 days of the date of billing) may be required first to pay that amount plus any applicable interest (or demonstrate that the fee has been paid) and then make an advance payment of the full amount of the estimated fee before the new or pending request is processed.

(c) Interest charges may be assessed on any unpaid bill starting on the 31st day following the day on which the billing was sent at the rate presecribed in 31 U.S.C. 3717 and will accrue from the date of billing.

(d) The Debt Collection Act of 1982, Pub. L. 97-365, including disclosure to consumer credit reporting agencies and the use of collection agencies will be utilized to encourage payment where appropriate.

[54 FR 3023, Jan. 23, 1989]

Commercial requesters. When documents are requested for commercial use, the requester will be assessed the full direct costs of searching for, reviewing for release, and duplicating the records sought.

(b) Educational or noncommercial scientific institutions requesters. When records are being requested by educational or noncommercial scientific institutions whose purpose is scholarly or scientific research, and not for commercial use, the requester will be assessed only for the cost of duplicating the records sought, but no charge will be made for the first 100 paper pages reproduced.

(c) News media requesters. When records are being requested by representatives of the “news media,” as defined by 5 U.S.C. 552(a)(4)(A)(ii) of the FOIA, the requester will be assessed only for the cost of duplicating the records sought, but no charge will be made for the first 100 paper pages reproduced.

(d) Other requesters. For any other request not described in paragraphs (a) through (c) of this section, the requester will be assessed the full direct costs of searching for and duplicating the records sought, except that no charge will be made for the first two hours of manual search time and the first 100 paper pages of reproduction.

(e) Requesters acting in concert. For purposes of paragraphs (b) through (d) of this section, whenever it reasonably appears that a requester, or a group of requesters acting in concert, is attempting to break down a single request into a series of requests relating to the same subject matter for the purpose of evading the assessment of fees, such requests will be aggregated and fees assessed accordingly.

(f) Clarification of records use. Where the FOIA officer has reasonable cause to doubt the use to which a requester will put the records sought, or where that use is not clear from the request itself, the FOIA officer may seek clarification from the requester before assigning the request to a specific category for fee assessment purposes.