Summary: Miss X complained the Council has repeatedly failed to collect her recycling on the scheduled days, whilst collecting her neighbours. The Council’s repeated failure to collect Miss X’s recycling or to explain the reason for this by tagging the bins or engaging with Miss X amounts to fault. This fault has caused Miss X an injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Miss X complained the Council has repeatedly failed to collect her recycling on the scheduled days, whilst collecting her neighbours. Miss X complained the collection crews are singling her out and picking and choosing when to collect her recycling.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. As part of the investigation, I have:
• considered the complaint and the documents provided by Miss X;
• made enquiries of the Council and considered the comments and documents the Council provided;
• discussed the issues with Miss X;
• Miss X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

Refuse and recycling collections

5. Councils have a duty under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 to collect household waste and recycling from properties in its area. The collections do not have to be weekly and councils can decide the type of bins or boxes people must use.
6. The Council's practice is to make a weekly household waste collection and a fortnightly recycling collection.
7. When a resident reports a missed collection, the Depot will ask the crew to return to complete the round as soon as possible. When the Council has completed the collection, it closes the report.

What happened here

8. Miss X states she started to notice problems with her recycling collections around August 2021. Miss X acknowledges there may have been a couple of occasions of cross contamination, but states she was never told of this. Unless the crews put tags on her bins notifying her of a problem, she questions how she was expected to know why her bin was not collected. Miss X does not consider concerns about contamination explain all of the missed collections.
9. According to the Council’s records Miss X reported eight missed recycling collections between June 2021 and March 2022. The reports are all closed which indicates the Council has since made the missed collections. However, the dates these reports were closed are inconsistent and do not suggest the Council made the collections in a timely manner.
10. For example, Miss X reported missed collections on 24 August and 7 September 2021. The Council closed these reports on 13 September and 21 September 2021 respectively. It is unclear why, if the Council made a collection on 13 September 2021, it did not close both reports that day.
11. Similarly, Miss X reported a missed collection on 26 January 2022, which the Council closed on 8 February 2022. However Miss X reported the collection scheduled for 8 February 2022 as missed and the Council closed this report on 22 February 2022. If the Council had made the collection scheduled for 8 February 2022 Miss X would not have needed to report a missed collection. Alternatively, if the Council had returned later on 8 February 2022 to make the missed collection the Council could have closed both reports that day.
12. In addition to reporting missed collections, Miss X also made formal complaints about the service. In November 2021 she complained about numerous missed recycling and household waste collections. She noted that on one occasion the recycling had not been sorted properly but since then had been careful to ensure the waste goes in the correct bins. Miss X provided photographs of the crews not collecting her recycling and stated that on occasions the collection crews did not even open the lids of her bins. She questioned whether there was a reason her property was repeatedly missed while her neighbours’ waste was collected.
13. The Council apologised for the poor standard of service. It noted the recent missed household waste and recycling collections had now been made. The Council stated it had experienced some localised disruption to its collections services due to operational difficulties.
14. As Miss X was not satisfied by the Council’s response and there were further missed collections, she asked the Council to review her complaint. The Council consulted the depot and then responded to Miss X in early February 2022. It stated the depot reported Miss X’s recycling was not collected as the bins were often mixed or contaminated. The depot had advised the Council it had ‘tagged’ Miss X’s bins when they were contaminated but given the ongoing problems the Council did not believe this was the case.
15. The Council upheld Miss X’s complaint and considered a breakdown in communication had exacerbated the situation. It arranged to empty Miss X’s bins so that she could start recycling again.
16. Miss X made a further complaint in March 2022 that the Council had again missed recycling collections for consecutive weeks. She offered to provide video evidence of the collection crew lifting the bin lid, pulling out cardboard and then replacing it and closing the lid. Miss X asserted her bins were not contaminated and the collection crew had not tagged her bins to indicate there was a problem.
17. The Council reviewed the videos and noted Miss X was not using the paper pod. It wrote to Miss X advising that if Miss X placed cardboard and paper in the main body of the wheelie bin, rather than in the pod, the bin would be classified as contaminated. The Council confirmed it has asked the depot to empty Miss X’s bins so that she could start using the pods.
18. Miss X remains dissatisfied with the Council’s response and has asked the Ombudsman to investigate her complaint. Miss X considered the Council had tried to assist her in resolving the problem, but she felt the depot was singling her out and discriminating against her. She states she has now bought stickers to specify what is in each box /bin.
19. In response to my enquiries the Council states Miss X frequently failed to present her recycling correctly by not using her paper pod, which caused her recycling to be contaminated.
20. The Council confirmed crews should tag any bins they find to be contaminated. If the problem persists the crew and assistant service manager should escalate it so that the waste prevention team can engage with the resident. It has reminded the depot of the need to alert waste prevention whenever they encounter repeat contamination from individual properties.

Analysis

21. It is clear from the Council’s records that it has repeatedly failed to collect Miss X’s recycling. There are differing accounts for why collections were missed. Miss X states that save for one occasion, she routinely separated her recycling and her bins were not contaminated or tagged by the collection crew. While the depot states the bins were regularly contaminated and that the collection crew tagged the bins to reflect this.
22. The Council’s response to Miss X’s complaint the Council appears to accept the collection crew did not tag Miss X’s bins when they considered they were contaminated. Miss X would therefore have been unaware of the reason and unable to take any action to address the situation. In the absence of tags to explain the missed collections it is not surprising Miss X felt she was being singled out when only her recycling was missed.
23. The depot’s response to the Council suggests it was aware of a problem with the way Miss X presented her recycling, yet it did not take any action to address this. Miss X states there were occasions where the crew did not even lift the bin lids, perhaps assuming, rather than checking whether the bins were contaminated.
24. The failure to collect Miss X’s recycling or to explain the reason for this by tagging the bins or engaging with Miss X amounts to fault. This has led to an accumulation of recycling at Miss X’s property which she has had to manage and has put her to unnecessary time and trouble.
25. I also consider there to be fault in the way the Council has responded to Miss X’s complaint. The initial response simply confirms the missed collections have now been made and refers to operational difficulties. It does not address Miss X’s concerns about her bins being missed when her neighbours’ are collected or suggest there is a problem with contaminated bins. The generic nature of the response suggests the Council had not properly investigated Miss X’s complaint.
26. I recognise the review involved a more through investigation and the response explained and addressed the issues. But this review would not have been necessary had the Council investigated the complaint fully at the outset.
27. The Council’s reminder to depots of the need to alert the waste prevention team whenever it encounters repeat contamination is to be welcomed. However I consider depots should also be reminded of the need to tag contaminated bins so that residents are aware why their waste has not been collected.

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Agreed action

28. The Council has agreed to apologise to Miss X and pay her £100 in recognition of the frustration, difficulties the failure to make regular recycling collections or explain why they were missed has caused.
29. The Council has also agreed to remind depots of the need for collection crews to tag contaminated bins so that residents are immediately aware of the reason for non-collection.
30. The Council should take this action within one month of the final decision on this complaint.

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Final decision

31. The Council’s repeated failure to collect Miss X’s recycling or to explain the reason for this by tagging the bins or engaging with Miss X amounts to fault. This fault has caused Miss X an injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman