Around Europe there is a huge range of timeframes for answering requests and for providing information, for notifications of extensions or issuing refusals. The average is about 15 working days, or about 3 weeks. See Annex E for more details.

The countries with the fastest responses are Norway and Sweden where the access to information laws do not establish a time frame but, in practice, requests are answered within about 1-3 days. In Sweden requests should be answered “immediately” and in Norway administrative silence can be appealed after 2 weeks. At the other end of the scale, in Albania public institutions have 40 days to respond and in Austria the law establishes an eight week (60 calendar day) timeframe. Another exceptionally long timeframe is Spain, which does not have an access to information law but where the administrative law gives public authorities 3 months to respond to requests for access to public archives and registers.

The European Union Regulation 1049/2001 establishes 15 working days for responding to requests; an extension of up to 15 additional working days may be applied in “exceptional cases, for example in the event of an application relating to a very long document or to a very large number of documents.”

Note: Under the Aarhus Convention rules, the timeframe for providing environmental information is one month. You will need to check your national law to see if there is a specific timeframe for environmental information.

Extensions in case of complex requests: Most countries permit public bodies to extend the timeframes for a few days or up to a month if the request is particularly complex. In all cases the requestor should be notified of the delay and the reasons should be given. More details are found in Annex E.

TIP! In all countries, it is better to start with a simple request for information and then to add more questions once you get the initial information. That way you don’t run the risk of the public institution applying an extension because it is a “complex request”.