I am writing to confirm that I have now completed my search for the information which you requested.

Request

I am having difficulty in obtaining an e-mail address for a Dental Surgery.

From a google search all I can find is the address etc but no website or e-mail address.

The address for the Dental surgery is listed below: Smile Dental Surgery, 270 Barking Rd, London E6 3BA

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on

We have handled your request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000.

Our response

We have considered this request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and we are issuing a refusal notice under section 17 of the FOIA.

We can confirm that we do hold the requested information, but this information is exempt under section 40(2) of the FOIA (personal information), as the email address for the above dental surgery contains personal data of a staff member.

Section 40(2) is an absolute, prejudice-based exemption and therefore is exempt if disclosure would contravene any of the data protection principles. In order for disclosure to comply with the lawfulness, fairness, and transparency principle, we either need the consent of the data subject(s) or there must be a legitimate interest in disclosure. In addition, the disclosure must be necessary to meet the legitimate interest and finally, the disclosure must not cause unwarranted harm. As we do not have the consent of the data subject(s), the NHSBSA is therefore required to conduct a balancing exercise between legitimate interest of the applicant in disclosure against the rights and freedoms of the data subject(s).

The NHSBSA acknowledges that you have a legitimate interest in disclosure of the information in order to provide the full picture of the requested data held by the NHSBSA; however, we have concluded that disclosure of the requested information would cause unwarranted harm and therefore, section 40(2) is engaged. This is because there is a reasonable expectation that patient data processed by the NHSBSA remains confidential.

Please be aware that I have decided not to release full details of staff names as this information falls under the exemption in Section 40 subsections 2 and 3(A)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act.

This is because it would breach the first data protection principle as:

a) It is not fair to disclose these people’s personal details to the world and is likely to cause damage or distress to the staff member.

b) These details are not of sufficient interest to the public to warrant an intrusion into the privacy of those staff.

Please see the web link below to see the exemption in full.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/36/section/40

Publishing this response

Please note that this information will be published on our Freedom of Information disclosure log at:

https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/foi-02246