FOI reference: FOI-2024-1795

You asked

Under the Freedom of Information Act, please could I request the following information: 

Question 1:  Please advise how many Data Subject Access Requests (hereafter referred to as SARs) you received and responded to in 2021, 2022 and 2023 relating to employees (past or present) and other requests (e.g. customers, general public, service users etc). 

Question 2:  When responding to SARS do you manage the process in-house, or do you outsource the whole or part of the process? And if conducted in house please specify the name of the team/function that is responsible for this part of the process (eg Data Privacy, HR, etc).   

If for example you outsource one type of SAR (e.g. employee) but complete others (e.g. citizen/customer) inhouse, please provide details. 

Question 3:  Approximately how many working hours does it take to pull together a typical SARs response, this includes the time taken to collate and redact the information, and putting the information together for issuing?  

Question 4:  What is the estimated percentage of handwritten documentation within a typical SAR response?

We said

Thank you for your request. 

Q1:

2021:

  • Employee past/present: 42 
  • Other: 10 

2022:  

  • Employee past/present: 20 
  • Other: 27 

2023: 

  • Employee past/present: 20 
  • Other: 51

Q2:

Subject Access Requests (SARs) are managed entirely in-house by the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) Legal Services team. This is overseen by the Data Protection Officer (DPO) and Head of Legal Services.

Q3 and 4:

We do not hold the requested information in a recorded form.