FOI Request - Administrative Cost of School Meal Debt

Request 101003403209

I would like to request the following under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2002.

1. How much does the local authority spend in terms of administration costs in relation to school meal debt?

2. How much does the local authority spend in terms of labouring hours in relation to school meal debt?

Response 19-10-2023

1. & 2. Not held. There are 45 primary schools and in Catering there are 46 staff members responsible in some part of the process of recovery of school meal debt. This includes Cook/catering assistants that send out reminder emails from the Ipay system or fill in letter template for parents not on the Ipay system. The time spent on this is approx. 30 minutes per week. Catering management and 1 admin staff 85.75 hours per year, pulling together the information required to process invoices and raise invoices.
However, the information on costs is not recorded separately, as the time spent is within the overall working hours. Information that is not held falls under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 - Information not held.