Financial Crime (340A/21)
Request
Please could you provide me with the below information
How many people over the age of 60 (or closest age range) reported a financial crime or financial fraud in your region in 2019 and 2020.
How many people were convicted of a financial crime or financial fraud in your region in 2019 and 2020.
How many reports of becoming a victim of COVID vaccine fraud have there been in your region? Please provide information split by age range if possible.
Please report each category separately for each year.
Response
Our data are not organised in such a way as to allow us to provide this information within the appropriate (cost) limit within the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act (see ‘Reason for Decision’ below).
Although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the Freedom of Information Act, as a gesture of goodwill I have supplied information, relative to your request, retrieved before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded (see attached). I trust this is helpful, but it does not affect our legal right to rely on the fees regulations for the remainder of the request.
REASON FOR DECISION
Please note that researching each individual case would exceed the appropriate limit (FOIA, s.12). We do not hold conviction data, only offences by outcome, we are also unable to split the data in relation to question 3 by age. In respect of points 1 and 3 Action Fraud would be able to provide the most accurate data as not all reports are sent to us.
The cost of compliance with the whole of your request is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information would exceed the appropriate costs limit under section 12(1) of the FOI Act 2000. For West Midlands Police, the appropriate limit is set at £450, as prescribed by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004, S.I. 3244.