Freedom of Information
Consumer Scotland wants to ensure you are able to access the information you need and be confident that your information is in safe hands.
The Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (the Act) requires Scottish public authorities to produce and maintain a publication scheme. Authorities are under a legal obligation to:
- Publish the classes of information that they make routinely available
- Tell the public how to access the information and what it might cost
We will regularly publish a range of information and have adopted the Scottish Information Commissioner's Model Publication Scheme. If you prefer a copy to be provided to you in another format please make a request via our contact us pages.
The purpose of this Guide to Information is to:
- Allow the public to see what information is available (and what is not available) in relation to each class
- State what, if any, charges may be applied
- Explain how to find the information easily
- Provide contact details for enquiries and to get help with accessing the information
- Explain how to request information we hold that has not been published
Availability and Formats
The information we publish through the model scheme is, wherever possible, available on our website. We offer alternative arrangements for people who do not want to, or cannot, access the information online or by inspection at our premises. For example, we can usually arrange to send information to you in paper copy (although there may be a charge for this).
Exempt Information
We will publish the information we hold that falls within the classes of information below. If a document contains information that is exempt under Scotland’s freedom of information laws e.g. sensitive personal information, we will remove or redact the information before publication and explain why.
Copyright
Where Consumer Scotland holds the copyright in its published information, the information may be copied or reproduced without formal permission, provided that:
- it is copied or reproduced accurately
- it is not used in a misleading context, and
- the source of the material is identified
Where Consumer Scotland does not hold the copyright in information we publish, we will make this clear.
Charges
This section explains when we may make a charge for our publications and how any charge will be calculated.
There is no charge to view information on our website or at our premises.
We may charge for providing information to you e.g., photocopying and postage, but we will charge you no more than it actually costs us to do so. We will always tell you what the cost is before providing the information to you.
Our photocopying charge per side of paper is shown in the tables below:
Black and white photocopying
Size of paper |
Pence per sheet of paper |
|
A4 |
10p |
Colour photocopying
Size of paper |
Pence per sheet of paper |
|
A4 |
30p |
We will recharge any postage costs at the rate we paid to send the information to you.
We do not pass on any other costs to you in relation to our published information.
Contact Us
You can contact us for assistance with any aspect of this publication scheme:
Consumer Scotland
Records Management
Thistle House
91 Haymarket Terrace
EH12 5HD
Email: corporateservices@consumer.scot
We will also be pleased to advise you how to ask for information that we do not publish or how to complain if you are dissatisfied with any aspect of this publication scheme.
The Classes of Information that we publish
We publish information that we hold within the following classes. Once information is published under a class we will continue to make it available for the current and previous two financial years.
Where information has been updated or superseded, only the current version will be available. If you would like to see previous versions, you may make a request to us for that information.
We will publish information in the following classes:
Class 1: Information about Consumer Scotland, who we are, where to find us, how to contact us, how we are managed and our external relations.
Please see the about us and contact us pages.
Class 2: How we deliver our functions and services - Information about our work, our strategies and policies for delivering our functions and services and information for our service users.
Our Strategic Plan and our Work Programme are available on our website.
Class 3: How we take decisions and what we have decided - Information about the decisions we take, how we make decisions and how we involve others.
We will publish minutes of our Board meetings regularly on our website. Our Board operates under agreed Standing Orders and we have a Framework Agreement with the Scottish Government, both of which can be found on the who we are page.
Class 4: What we spend and how we spend it - Information about our strategy for, and management of, financial resources.
Year-end financial information is published in our Annual Report and Accounts.
Class 5: How we manage our human, physical and information resources
- Our staffing structure and staff handbook are available on request
- We do not currently hold any physical resources.
- Our Privacy Policy is available on our website
- Our Records Management Plan is available on request.
Class 6: How we procure goods and services from external providers
A Consumer Scotland procurement policy is in development.
Class 7: How we are performing - Information about how we perform as an organisation and how well we deliver our functions and services.
Our Strategic Plan commits us to developing a set of performance indicators and reporting against these annually. Consumer Scotland's Annual Report is published annually on our website.
Class 8: Our commercial publications - Information packaged and made available for sale on a commercial basis and sold at market value through a retail outlet e.g., bookshop, museum or research journal.
We do not currently sell any information on a commercial basis.
Class 9: Our open data - The open data we make available as described by the Scottish Government’s Open Data Strategy and Resource Pack, available under an open licence.
We do not currently hold any data that we make available in this way.
How to make a Freedom of Information request
If the information you are looking for isn't covered above, you can make a request to us to release it.
For non-personal information, please email your request to corporateservices@consumer.scot, including your name and as much detail as possible about the information you are seeking.
For guidance on how to make a request, please see the Scottish Information Commissioner's website:
Freedom of Information At A Glance / How Do I Ask? / Tips For Requesters
Once we receive your request, we will acknowledge it and respond within 20 working days. We will not normally charge for responding, but if we consider your request likely to cost more than £600 we may refuse your request and advise on how your request can be modified to come under this threshold. We may also charge if you request hard copies of the information.
We publish our Freedom of Information responses on this page.
2023-2024
2024-FOI-004: Spending on public relations
2024-FOI-003: Unlawful postal deliveries
2023-FOI-002: Salaries, expenses and pensions
2023-FOI-001: Consumer Scotland recruitment
2022-2023