51A   Effect of waiver, reduction or refund of application fee

(1)  An agency is not to treat an application as being an invalid access application only because of the non-payment of the required application fee if:

(a)  the payment of the fee was waived by the agency before the application was made, or

(b)  the amount of the fee payable was reduced by the agency before the application was made and the reduced fee accompanied the application.

Note. Section 127 enables an agency to waive, reduce or refund a fee payable or paid under this Act for an application fee in any case that the agency thinks appropriate, subject to the regulations.

(2)  If an agency waives payment of the required application fee, or reduces the amount of the fee that is payable, after the application is made (and the application would have been valid had the required application fee been paid):

(a)  in the case of a waived fee—the application becomes a valid access application and is deemed to have been made when the fee was waived, or

(b)  in the case of a reduced fee—the application becomes a valid access application when the reduced fee is paid and is deemed to have been made when the payment is made.

(3)  The refund of an application fee does not affect the validity of an access application that was duly made.