(a) General. The Fee Schedule described in this section will be used to recover the cost for Flood Plain Management Services requiring more than ten minutes and up to one work day to provide. The Fee Schedule has been designed to minimize administrative costs and to allow the flexibility needed to recover the approximate total costs for services provided to Federal agencies and private persons.

(b) Level of effort. For establishing charges, services covered by the Fee Schedule have been divided into five levels as follows:

(1) Level 1 includes the provision of basic information from readily available data that does not require technical evaluation or documentation and is transmitted by form letter to the customer.

(2) Level 2 includes the provision of information from readily available data that requires minimal technical evaluation and is transmitted by form letter to the customer.

(3) Level 3 includes the provision of information that requires some file search, a brief technical evaluation, and documentation of results by a form letter or brief composed letter to the customer.

(4) Level 4 includes the provision of information and assistance that requires moderate file search, a brief technical evaluation, and documentation of results in a composed letter to the customer.

(5) Level 5 includes the provision of information and assistance that requires significant file search or retrieval of archived data, a moderate technical evaluation, and documentation of results in a brief letter report to the customer.

(c) Charge determination. The Fee Schedule will be used Corps-wide. As requests are received, the responding office will select the appropriate level on the Fee Schedule to determine the charge for providing the service.

(d) Provision of services. The services will be provided on a first-come, first-served basis after payment has been received.

(e) Fees. The Fee Schedule, including a brief description of the services in each of the five levels and the related charges, is shown in Table 1 to this section. The fee for each level is based on a Corps-wide average of estimated current costs for providing that level of service.

(f) Review and revision of fees. The fees shown in the Fee Schedule will be reviewed each fiscal year using the most current cost data available. If necessary, the Fee Schedule will be revised after public notice and comment.