Summary: Mr X complains the Council has repeatedly failed to collect his household waste on the scheduled day or in a timely manner when they are missed. The Council’s repeated failure to make regular household waste collections since October 2018 amounts to fault. This fault has caused Mr X an injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr X complains the Council has repeatedly failed to collect his household waste on the scheduled day or in a timely manner when they are missed. Mr X states he had virtually no refuse or recycling collections for nine months and had to store or dispose of the waste himself

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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 a council’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 Mr X;
• made enquiries of the Council and considered the comments and documents the Council provided;
• sent a statement setting out my draft decision to Mr X and the Council and invited their comments.

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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 collect household waste weekly and recycling fortnightly.
7. When a missed collection is reported to the Council, the Depot will ask the crew to return to complete the round as soon as possible. When the collection is complete, the Council closes the report.
8. In September 2018 the Council introduced a new operating model. Under this model, scheduled collection days remained the same, but the collection rounds/routes changed.
9. At the end of December 2018 collection crews began industrial action. The Council introduced a contingency plan to make one collection for all waste types each week rather than separate collections of household waste and recycling. The crews began working to rule on 29 December 2018 and the first full day of industrial action was 19 February 2019.
10. The Council moved to a fortnightly collection for all waste types in February 2019. When the industrial action ended in mid-March 2019, the Council returned to weekly household and fortnightly recycling collections.

What happened here

11. Mr X complains the Council repeatedly failed to collect his household waste between October 2018 and June 2019. He states that for nine months the Council made almost no household waste collections. Mr X reported the missed collections and the Council closed the reports but did not collect the waste. Mr X had to store large amounts of rubbish and made several trips to the tip.
12. The Council’s records show Mr X reported 23 missed household waste collections between October 2018 and June 2019. The reports are all closed which suggests the collections have been made. However, the dates these reports were closed do not suggest collections were made in a timely manner or on the next scheduled collection day. There are also inconsistencies in the dates these reports were closed.
13. For example, Mr X reported missed collections on 3, 11 and 17 October 2018 and the Council closed these reports on 18, 24 October and 9 November 2018 respectively. This not only suggests there were delays in collecting the waste, but also calls into question the accuracy of the Council’s records. If the Council had collected the waste on 18 October 2018, it could have closed all three reports that day.
14. Discrepancies of this nature appear throughout the Council’s records.
15. The Council states there may be a delay between the missed collections being made and the report being closed, so it is not necessarily the case that the intervening collections were also missed. However, the Council has not provided evidence of the dates the missed collections were made where they are different to the date the report was closed.
16. In addition to reporting missed collections, Mr X also complained to the Council. In early December 2018 Mr X complained his household waste had not been collected for over six weeks. Mr X was concerned that he had logged the missed collections and they had been marked as closed even though the Council had not collected the waste.
17. In its response the Council apologised for any inconvenience. It explained it had implemented new routes across the city and this new system would take some time to bed in. The Council confirmed it had arranged for the waste that should have been collected on 26 December 2018 to be collected on 2 January 2019.
18. The Council also advised that industrial action was due to begin on 29 December 2018 and it had prepared a plan to minimise the disruption this action caused.
19. Mr X contacted the Council again on 2 January 2019 as his household waste had still not been collected. It was now 13 weeks since the Council last collected his household waste. The Council confirmed it had escalated the matter to the depot and had asked it to remind crews to ensure the properties received a better standard of service.
20. This did not resolve the problem and Mr X continued to complain to the Council throughout January 2019 when his household waste was not collected. Mr X was unhappy he had been given several different explanations for the problem, but it had not been resolved. He considered it was a routing problem as household waste on the surrounding roads was collected while his street was continually missed.
21. Mr X made a further complaint to the Council on 18 April 2019. He stated the Council did not collect his household waste for approximately 20 weeks. He then received two collections in March 2019, but the Council had missed the following four collections. Mr X asked the Council to investigate and resolve the matter.
22. The Council responded on 20 May 2019 and confirmed it had requested an immediate collection. The Council also stated Mr X’s property fell on the boundary of two collection crews and had not been routed to either of the rounds. This matter had been addressed following Mr X’s previous complaint and collections should have been made as scheduled. The Council apologised for the further problems and advised it would be rectified as soon as possible.
23. On 6 June 2019 Mr X asked for his complaint to be considered further. He stated the Council had only collected his waste three times since October 2018. The Council explained the depot was experiencing some operational difficulties which it was working to resolve. The Council aimed to have the refuse collection service back on track as soon as possible and apologised for the shortcomings in the service.
24. Mr X was not satisfied by the Council’s response and has asked the Ombudsman to investigate his complaint. He is unhappy the Council repeatedly told him the problem would be resolved, only for it to continue the following week.
25. In response to my enquiries the Council states that following the introduction of the new working arrangements in September 2018, the depot failed to clearly identify which household crew was due to collect household waste from Mr X’s stretch of road. This administrative error led to the missed household collections. When the problem came to light in mid-June 2019, the service manager instructed the designated crew to collect from this location each week. The Council states this has resolved the problem and Mr X has had scheduled household collections since July 2019.
26. The Council has also monitored Mr X’s household waste collection for four weeks in October and November 2019, and states they were all completed.

Analysis

27. It is clear from the documentation I have received that there have been repeated failings in the Council’s service which amount to fault.
28. The Council accepts that collections have been missed, and that there will have been delays in these missed collections being made. Its records of Mr X’s reported missed collections, when the collections were subsequently made, and the reports closed are incomplete and inconsistent. And it is concerning that the Council appears to have closed the reports of missed collections when the waste had not been collected.
29. It is also disappointing that the Council was not more proactive given Mr X reported such a high number of missed collections. I would have expected this level of missed collections to have alerted the Council to a potential problem. This should then have prompted an investigation to identify and resolve the issue. The Council states reports of missed collection are now referred to a senior officer daily, and I recognise this should have a positive effect in identifying and resolving issues. But I consider the Council should have done more to address Mr X’s repeated missed collections sooner.
30. I also consider there to be fault in the way the Council has responded to Mr X’s complaints. It is unclear at what point the Council became aware Mr X’s property was not included on a collection route. Its initial responses to Mr X’s complaints provided generic information about the changes in working arrangements and the industrial action. They did not address his specific concerns or explain that his property is not included on a collection route.
31. The Council’s response to my enquiries states it became aware of the problem in mid-June 2019. But in its response to Mr X’s complaint in May 2019 the Council states the issue of the collection routes was identified and resolved following his earlier complaint. If the Council was aware of the problem in early 2019, it could, and should have resolved the issue much sooner. If the Council was not aware of the problem until June 2019, this raises questions about the effectiveness of its investigation of Mr X’s complaint. Either way, this is not satisfactory and amounts to fault.
32. Having identified fault, I must now consider whether this has caused Mr X an injustice. Mr X has had to find ways to manage the uncollected household waste left at his property over a significant period, including making regular trips to the tip. He has also experienced frustration and disappointment, both with the missed collections while properties opposite had collections, and the Council’s poor complaint responses. Mr X has been put to unnecessary time and trouble in trying to resolve this matter.

Agreed action

33. The Council has agreed to apologise to Mr X and pay him £300 in recognition of the frustration and difficulties the failure to make regular household waste collections since October 2018 has caused.
34. The Council should carry out this action within one month of the final decision on this complaint.

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Final decision

35. The repeated failure to make regular household waste collections since October 2018 amounts to fault. This fault has caused Mr X an injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman