FOI_26-193 UEA Sportspark membership and usage

Date of response: 18 September 2026

We have now considered your request of 24 August 2026 for the following information:

Question 1. Membership Sales & Active User Volumes

The total number of active and/or sold memberships per year, broken down by:

Membership Tier:

• Gold

• Silver

• Bronze / Off-Peak packages (e.g., Off-Peak Gym & Swim, Off-Peak Group Ex & Swim)

Our response:

Exemption – Section 43(2) Prejudice to commercial interests of the University – see exemption explanation text at the end of our responses.

User Category:

• UEA Students

• UEA Staff

• Blue Light Cardholders

• General Public / Community

(For the avoidance of doubt, this request strictly seeks aggregate headcount/volume data rather than commercially sensitive pricing models, financial forecasts, or individual contract terms).

Our response:

Please see accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A.

This data shows the live headcount (active user) at the end of each month for each category that we monitor. As these are live figures taken on the day we cannot back-date or breakdown further.

We do not log blue-light separately to public memberships and so blue-light figures are contained within the relevant category – UEA Students, UEA Staff and Public.

Question 2. Fitness Centre Hourly Footfall / Turnstile Data

Access control and turnstile scan data for the Fitness Centre (Gym), provided as aggregated hourly totals or monthly hourly averages:

Our response:

Please see accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A.

Please note that all swipes will also include any made by Sportspark staff in the undertaking of their duties (explaining the early morning swipes).

• Broken down by hourly intervals across opening hours (e.g., 06:00 to 22:00).

Our response:

Please see accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A.

• Broken down by day of the week (Monday through Sunday).

Our response:

Please see accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A. Please note that all swipes will also include any made by Sportspark staff in the undertaking of their duties

• Aggregated by month across the requested period (August 2024 – July 2026).

Our response:

Please see accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A. Please note that all swipes will also include any made by Sportspark staff in the undertaking of their duties

• Delineated by Entry swipes and Exit swipes (or concurrent hourly occupancy figures if recorded).

Our response:

There is no requirement for Fitness Centre users to swipe out of the facility and therefore there is no current method of tracking either exits or hourly occupancy figures. Entry swipe data is provided within accompanying document, our ref: FOI_26-193 Appendix A.

Please note that all swipes will also include any made by Sportspark staff in the undertaking of their duties

Question 3. Fitness Centre Space & Capacity Limits

• The total designated maximum safe concurrent capacity (occupancy limit) for the Fitness Centre.

Our response:

Maximum Capacity maintained at 125 users, 128 total for the room (including staff)

• The average and peak concurrent occupancy during weekday across term time.

Our response:

On this occasion it is not possible to provide any of the requested information. In line with your rights under section 1(1)(a) of the Act to be informed whether information is held, we confirm that the University does not hold any recorded information for average and peak occupancy during weekdays across term time. There is no requirement for Fitness Centre users to swipe out of the facility and therefore there is no current method of tracking concurrent occupancy figures.

• Any recorded incident logs or reports regarding turnstile queues or capacity caps being reached between August 2024 and July 2026.

Our response:

On this occasion it is not possible to provide any of the requested information. In line with your rights under section 1(1)(a) of the Act to be informed whether information is held, we confirm that the University does not hold any recorded information for incident logs or reports regarding turnstile queues or capacity caps being reached during the requested period. The University do not record this information therefore; this information is not held.

Exemption text explanation – s.43 (2) Prejudice to commercial interests

On this occasion, it is not possible to provide all the requested information. The Act contains a number of exemptions that allow public authorities to withhold certain information from release. We have applied the following exemption(s) to part of your request, namely the breakdown of membership numbers by tier (Bronze, Silver or Gold).

To compete in the Higher Education market, with leading UK and international universities, the University must ensure that information that would be strategically useful to its competitors is not placed in the public domain. Release of a breakdown of users by membership tiers, would potentially compromise the University’s ability to be a well-led, managed and sustainable institution. The University’s commercial position would be compromised if it were to release information that would benefit its competitors.

The University’s Sportspark operates within a commercial capacity in relation to membership fees, with tiers of membership holding separate pricing structures and benefits.

Sportspark membership is an activity which is commercial in nature; the University charges our users a membership fee of which there are increasing charges depending on the membership type or level. This activity operates and occurs within a competitive environment, with many other sports facilities, gyms, sports clubs, public swimming pools etc operating close to and around the surround areas of University campus.

There is a strong likelihood that should a competitor know which membership tiers our users are paying, and the volumes of each type of tier, will allow for them to advertise and target user groups specifically to obtain their business, taking away potential future income from the University, which would not only affect our ability to effectively run UEA Sportspark, but will remove revenue and income from the University as a whole. Competition for sports facility membership is a commercial activity with high risk to our income from membership fees, not just for our students and staff, but from the general public.

The application of this exemption requires an examination of the public interest in disclosure as opposed to that in non-disclosure.

The factors in favour of disclosure would include:

• Increasing public understanding of the levels and active membership types of the Sportspark.

• There is significant public interest in user membership groups

Factors in favour of withholding the information are largely laid out in the explanation for the use of the exemption above but would include:

• Ensuring there is fair competition for public sectors

• Protecting the ability to compete on a level playing field

After consideration of the above factors, we believe, on balance, that the public interest lies in maintaining in the exemption relating to breakdown of members by membership tier.