16 C.F.R. § 1015.9 Fees for production of records.
Title 16 - Commercial Practices
(a) The Commission will provide, at no charge, certain routine information. For other Commission responses to information requests, the Secretary shall determine and levy fees for duplication, search, review, and other services, in accordance with this section. (b) Fees shall be paid by check or money order, payable to the Treasury of the United States and sent to the Commission. (c) The following definitions shall apply under this section: (1) Direct costs means those expenditures which an agency actually incurs in searching for and duplicating (and in the case of commercial requesters, reviewing) documents to respond to a FOIA request. (2) Search includes all time spent looking for material that is responsive to a request, including page-by-page or line-by-line identification of material within documents. (3) Duplication refers to the process of making a copy of a document necessary to respond to a FOIA request. (4) Review refers to the process of examining documents located in response to a commercial use request to determine whether any portion of any document located is permitted to be withheld. (5) Commercial use request refers to a request that seeks information for a use or purpose that furthers commercial, trade, or profit interests. (6) Educational institution refers to an entity organized and operated exclusively for educational purposes, whose purpose is scholarly. (7) Non-commercial scientific institution refers to an entity organized and operated exclusively for the purpose of conducting scientific research, the results of which are not intended to promote any particular product or industry. (8) Representative of the news media refers to any person or organization which regularly publishes or disseminates news to the public, in print or electronically. (d) A commercial use request may incur charges for duplication, search, and review. The following requests may incur charges only for duplication: A request from an educational institution for records not sought for commercial use; a request from a non-commercial scientific institution for records not sought for commercial use; a request from a representative of the news media. Any other request may incur charges for duplication and search. (e) The following fee schedule will apply: (1) Copies of documents reproduced on a standard photocopying machine: $0.10 per page. (2) File searches conducted by clerical personnel: $3.00 for each one-quarter hour (a fraction thereof to be counted as one-quarter hour). Any special costs of sending records from field locations to headquarters for review will be included in search fees, billed at the clerical personnel rate. (3) File searches conducted by non-clerical or professional or managerial personnel: $4.90 for each one-quarter hour (a fraction thereof to be counted as one-quarter hour). (4) Review of records: $4.90 for each one-quarter hour (a fraction thereof to be counted as one-quarter hour). (5) Computerized records: $0.10 per page of computer printouts or, for central processing, $0.32 per second of central processing unit (CPU) time; for printer, $10.00 per 1,000 lines; and for computer magnetic tapes or discs, direct costs. (6) Postage: Direct-cost basis for mailing requested materials, if the requester wants special handling or if the volume or dimensions of the materials requires special handling. (7) Microfiche: $0.35 for each frame. (8) Other charges for materials requiring special reproducing or handling, such as photographs, slides, blueprints, video and audio tape recordings, or other unusual materials: direct-cost basis. (9) Any other service: An appropriate fee established by the Secretary, based on direct costs. (f) Fees shall be waived as follows: (1) No automatic fee waiver shall apply to commercial use requests. (2) The first $10.00 of duplication costs shall be waived for requests from educational institutions, non-commercial scientific institutions, and representatives of the news media. (3) For all other requests, the first $10.00 of duplication costs and the first $40 of search costs shall be waived. (4) The Secretary shall waive or reduce fees whenever disclosure of the requested information is in the public interest because it is likely to contribute significantly to public understanding of the operations or activities of the government and disclosure of the requested information is not primarily in the commercial interest of the requester. (5) In making a determination under paragraph (f)(4) of this section, the Secretary shall consider the following factors: (i) The subject of the request: Whether the subject of the requested records concerns the operations or activities of the government. (ii) The informative value of the information to be disclosed: Whether the disclosure is likely to contribute to an understanding of government operations or activities. (iii) The contribution to an understanding of the subject by the general public likely to result from disclosure: Whether disclosure of the requested information will contribute to public understanding. (iv) The significance of the contribution to public understanding: Whether the disclosure is likely to contribute significantly to public understanding of government operations or activities. (v) The existence and magnitude of a commercial interest: Whether the requester has a commercial interest that would be furthered by the requested disclosure; and, if so (vi) The primary interest in disclosure: Whether the magnitude of the identified commercial interest of the requester is sufficiently large, in comparison with the public interest in disclosure, that disclosure is primarily in the commercial interest of the requester. (6) Any determination made by the Secretary concerning fee waivers may be appealed by the requester to the Commission's General Counsel in the manner described at §1015.7. (g) Collection of fees shall be in accordance with the following: (1) Interest will be charged on amounts billed, starting on the 31st day following the day on which the requester received the bill. Interest will be at the rate prescribed in 31 U.S.C. 3717. (2) Search fees will be imposed (on requesters charged for search time) even if no responsive documents are located or if the search leads to responsive documents that are withheld under an exemption to the Freedom of Information Act. Such fees shall not exceed $25.00, unless the requester has authorized a higher amount. (3) Before the Commission begins processing a request or discloses any information, it will require advance payment if: (i) Charges are estimated to exceed $250.00 and the requester has no history of payment and cannot provide satisfactory assurance that payment will be made; or (ii) A requester failed to pay the Commission for a previous Freedom of Information Act request within 30 days of the billing date. (4) The Commission will aggregate requests, for the purposes of billing, whenever it reasonably believes that a requester or group of requesters is attempting to separate a request into more than one request for the purpose of evading fees. (5) If a requester's total bill is less than $9.00, the Commission will not request payment. [52 FR 28979, Aug. 5, 1987, as amended at 62 FR 46198, Sept. 2, 1997]
Title 16: Commercial Practices
PART 1015—PROCEDURES FOR DISCLOSURE OR PRODUCTION OF INFORMATION UNDER THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT
Subpart A—Production or Disclosure Under 5 U.S.C. 552(a)
§ 1015.9 Fees for production of records.
