Can I ask for information instead of documents?

No. The EU FOI law is an access to documents law - this means you can only request documents from EU institutions, not information.

This doesn’t mean you need to know beforehand which document exists. For example, you can find a way of requesting „all documents thain contain information about“ a certain topic or relate to an event you are interested it.

 This is outlined in Article 3 of Regulation 1049/2001, where ‘document’ is defined:

“Document’ shall mean any content whatever its medium (written on paper or stored in electronic form or as a sound, visual or audiovisual recording) concerning a matter relating to the policies, activities and decisions falling within the institution’s sphere of responsibility”.

Luckily, when you file your request via our platform, we provide a standard formulation, which automatically puts your request in the right wording.