PAIA manual describing how to request access to records held by the business — compulsory for every private-sector entity since 1 January 2022 under s.51 PAIA.
⚠️ This is a blank template, not legal advice: check the wording with a lawyer and adapt it to your jurisdiction and your case.
This template has no optional clauses: the text is the same for everyone. Field placeholders are shown as labels — on the site the template is read-only, values are entered inside the system.
PAIA MANUAL (Section 51, Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000)
Entity name Entity contact details Effective date: Effective date
This manual is published in terms of section 51 of the Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000 ("PAIA"). Since 1 January 2022, a PAIA manual is compulsory for ALL private bodies, including sole proprietors and close corporations — the previous small-business exemption expired on 31 December 2021.
1. INFORMATION OFFICER 1.1. Information Officer: Information Officer. By default this is the head of the entity (owner/director) unless a deputy has been designated in writing.
2. RECORDS HELD 2.1. Categories of records held by Entity name: Categories of records held
3. RECORDS AVAILABLE WITHOUT A FORMAL REQUEST 3.1. Records available without a formal request
4. HOW TO REQUEST A RECORD 4.1. How to request a record 4.2. Fees payable for processing a request: Fees payable for a request (the standard fee structure prescribed under PAIA applies unless stated otherwise).
5. PERSONAL INFORMATION HELD (CROSS-REFERENCE TO POPIA) 5.1. Personal information held (cross-reference to POPIA) 5.2. See our separate POPIA privacy notice for the categories of personal information we hold and the purposes for which we process it.
⚠️ This manual is published on our website (where we have one) and is available on request at our place of business. Its absence is a straightforward compliance gap that is easy for a regulator or opposing party to identify — keep it current and cross-referenced with the POPIA privacy notice.
— — — ⚠️ This is a boilerplate template, not legal advice. Employment, consumer-protection, data protection, and food-safety law in South Africa is detailed and fact-specific (BCEA, LRA, POPIA, PAIA, CPA, ECTA, R638) — have this document reviewed and adapted by a labour/commercial lawyer, and where relevant checked against current CCMA and Information Regulator guidance, before use.
Fields that belong to a switched-off clause are dimmed — they are not asked for.
e.g. HR records, financial records, customer records, supplier records
1 of 9 fields are taken from the company, employee or counterparty record, the questionnaire can be dictated to the AI, and the finished document comes with a number, a PDF and an acknowledgement record.