How it works
One case. Six steps. Nothing released without a person saying yes.
Every request, whatever its type, runs through the same six steps. What changes between types is the clock, the exemptions and who signs off. The register, the search, the review discipline and the evidence pack are the same, so your officer learns one way of working and your records look the same every time.
The six steps
Receive
Requests arrive by email, letter, phone, web form or in person. Each goes on the register as the right type, with the right clock running from receipt. A request that mixes types is split into linked cases. An acknowledgement goes out.
Verify
Identity for the requester. Authority for anyone acting on their behalf, including solicitors and advocates. Scope, in the requester's words and in yours. All recorded on the case, so you can show who approved what and when.
Search
The system searches your housing management system, your Microsoft 365 estate and the other sources you connect, by name, address, tenancy or employee reference and the aliases you add. The search is logged: what was searched, with what terms, and what came back. That log is part of the evidence pack.
Review
Every document is shown with the requester's data marked and everyone else's flagged by type. Candidate exemptions are suggested where they might apply. Your officer decides include, redact, exempt or exclude, item by item, and records a reason. The system never decides for you.
Redact
Redactions are burned into the output. Metadata is stripped. Before anything is released, the system re-reads every outgoing file independently and blocks release if it finds data that should not be there. A second officer, or the DPO, confirms.
Respond
Response pack, covering letter and evidence pack go out together. The evidence pack shows what was asked, what was searched, what was found, what was provided, what was withheld and why, and who decided each point. If the requester complains, the file is already the file.
Why the human stays in
Accuracy does not remove the need for a signature. Someone has to be accountable for the decision to disclose or withhold, and that someone cannot be software. What the system does is shrink the work around the signature: it finds, it marks, it suggests, it checks, it records. Your officer decides.