Summary: Miss X complains the Council has repeatedly failed to collect her household waste and recycling on the scheduled day. The Council’s repeated failure to make regular assisted household waste and recycling collections amounts to fault. This fault has caused Miss X an injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Miss X complains the Council has repeatedly failed to collect her household waste and recycling on the scheduled day. Miss X receives assisted collections and complains that although her neighbours’ waste and recycling is collected, hers is repeatedly missed.

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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 information provided by Miss X;
• made enquiries of the Council and considered the comments and documents the Council provided;
• sent a statement setting out my draft decision to Miss 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 make a weekly household waste collection and a fortnightly recycling collection.
7. 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.
8. 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.
9. 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.
10. The Council provides an assisted collection service for people who are unable to move their bins and boxes due to a disability or age. The Council should collect the bins from the storage point and return them to the same point.
11. 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.

What happened here

12. Miss X complains the Council has repeatedly failed to collect her household waste or recycling on the scheduled day. Miss X should receive assisted collections, but she states there have been problems with this service since late 2018. Miss X complains of periods of weeks, and sometimes months, where her household waste and recycling have not been collected.
13. The Council’s records show Miss X has reported 15 missed household waste collections and four missed recycling collections over the last 12 months. The reports are all closed which indicates the missed collections have since been made. However, the dates these reports were closed are inconsistent and do not suggest the collections were all made in a timely manner. The records also suggest that other collections were also missed.
14. For example, Miss X reported a missed household waste collection on 4 April 2019, and the Council closed this report over four weeks later, on 7 May 2019. This would suggest that the collections scheduled for 11, 18 and 25 April, and 2 May 2019 were also missed. The records show Miss X reported a missed household waste collection on 25 April 2019, but the Council did not close this report until 30 May 2019. This is curious as if the Council had made a collection on 7 May 2019, it could have closed both reports that day.
15. The records also show Miss X reported missed household waste collections almost every week between July and early October 2019. The reports of missed collections in July were closed in early August, but the reports from 1 August 2019 onwards were closed between 11 November and 4 December 2019. Again, this is curious. If as the records suggest, a collection was made on 11 November 2019, why did the Council not close all the reports on this day. Similarly, if the Council had made the scheduled collections in October 2019, it could have closed the reports sooner.
16. The anomalies in the Council’s records call into question the reliability of this information.
17. 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.
18. In addition to reporting missed collections, Miss X also complained to the Council and sought assistance from her MP.
19. In May 2019 Miss X complained her household waste and recycling had not been collected for three weeks. She had reported the missed collections and been assured they would be collected, but this had not happened. Miss X reminded the Council she should have assisted collections and asked it to investigate the matter. The Council apologised for the inconvenience and confirmed that where a collection was missed it would clear the waste at the next available opportunity.
20. Miss X was not satisfied with the response and asked for her complaint to be reviewed. In its response the Council advised it had escalated the matter to the service manager. It also explained there were still a number of operational issues that needed attending to and the depot intended to achieve a prompt resolution.
21. As this did not resolve the problem Miss X made a further complaint in August 2019. Her household waste had again not been collected for four weeks. Miss X suggested that this could be viewed as discrimination as it was only her waste that was being collected. The Council referred to the challenging circumstances it had experienced since the start of the year and the ongoing operational difficulties which had resulted in missed collections. It confirmed it had asked the depot to remind the crews of Miss X’s assisted collections and said it would carry out periodic monitoring.
22. Miss X made a further complaint in October 2019 as the problem had not been resolved. The Council again apologised and confirmed the service manager had spoken to the crews and reminded them of Miss X’s assisted collections. Miss X has asked the Ombudsman to investigate her complaint.
23. In response to my enquiries the Council states it runs an assisted collection report at the start of each month with an updated list of all assisted collections. Properties are then manually added to each depot’s hard drive so they can print off and add this to crew information packs. Assisted collection properties also appear on the crew’s mobile technology. It has confirmed that Miss X has assisted collection status.
24. The Council has arranged to monitor Miss X’s household waste and recycling collections for a month to identify and rectify any repeated failures to collect Miss X’s bins.

Analysis

25. It is clear from the documentation I have received that there have been repeated failings in the Council’s service which amount to fault.
26. The Council accepts that collections have been missed, and that there will have been delays in these missed collections being made. Its records of Miss X’s reported missed collections, when the collections were subsequently made, and the reports closed are inconsistent. Given the anomalies in the Council’s records, I do not consider them to be a reliable indicator of the extent of the problem. It is possible there were more missed collections than the Council’s records suggest.
27. The Council has not offered an explanation for the repeated failure to collect Miss X’s household waste and recycling. The crews should be aware of Miss X’s assisted collections status and regularly collect her neighbours’ household waste and recycling, so it is unclear why Miss X’s bins are not routinely collected.
28. Given the volume of missed collections Miss X has reported, it is disappointing that the Council has not been more proactive in resolving the matter. This level of missed collections should have alerted the Council to a potential problem and prompted an investigation to identify and resolve the issue. The Council has repeatedly assured Miss X that it has made the depot and service manager aware of the problem and reminded the crews of her assisted collections, but the problem persists. There is no evidence the Council carried out the periodic monitoring referred to in its response to Miss X’s complaint of August 2019.
29. I recognise the Council is now monitoring Miss X’s household waste and recycling collections which should lead to an improvement in service. But I consider the Council should have done more to address Miss X’s repeated missed collections sooner.
30. Having identified fault, I must consider whether this has caused Miss X a significant injustice. Miss X has had to find ways to manage the uncollected household waste and recycling left at her property for extended periods. This accumulated waste has led to unpleasant smells and mess; and has attracted rodents. Miss X has also experienced frustration and disappointment, both with the missed collections and the Council's failure to resolve the problem. She has been put to unnecessary time and trouble in trying to resolve this matter.

Agreed action

31. The Council has agreed to apologise to Miss X and pay her £300 in recognition of the frustration and difficulties the repeated failure to make regular assisted household waste and recycling collections has caused.
32. The Council should carry out this action within one month of the final decision on this complaint.

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Final decision

33. The Council’s repeated failure to make regular assisted household waste and recycling collections amounts to fault. This fault has caused Miss X an injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman