Summary: The Council was at fault for repeatedly failing to collect
Mr B’s bins for almost a year. However, it has now fixed the problem and there have been no ongoing issues since January 2021. It has agreed to apologise to Mr B for its failures before that point, and to make a payment of £100 to recognise his injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I refer to as Mr B, complains that the Council repeatedly failed to collect his bins for around a year. He says it also closed reports he made of missed collections without doing anything about them.
2. Mr B says he went to a significant amount of trouble trying to get this matter resolved, and suffered avoidable distress because of the poor service. He also says he was caused inconvenience when he had to take rubbish to the tip himself on four occasions.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. 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

5. I considered information from Mr B and the Council. I also considered the Ombudsman publication, ‘Guidance on good practice: remedies’.
6. Mr B 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

What happened?

7. The Council provides four bins to its residents: grey (non-recyclable waste), green (food and garden waste), black (mixed recycling) and blue (paper and card). Green bins are collected weekly, grey fortnightly, and black and blue every four weeks. Mr B’s collection day is a Friday.
8. From February to the end of November 2020, Mr B reported that his bins had not been collected on ten occasions.
9. Following each report, the Council emptied the bins. However, on two of those occasions it closed Mr B’s request down on its system without doing anything, and Mr B had to re-report the collection failure.
10. Mr B’s neighbours also reported missed collections a further five times during this period.
11. At the end of November, Mr B submitted a complaint to the Council about the repeated missed collections throughout 2020.
12. The Council responded, apologising for the missed collections and for the frustration and inconvenience caused. It said it was having difficulty accessing bins because of parked cars blocking the route of the wagon round the corner from Mr B’s property. It said its waste supervisors had tried to persuade residents to move their cars (by delivering leaflets, for example) but with limited success. It said it had now put in place a ‘collection point’ to which residents could take their bins on collection day. It said that, on the next collection day, supervisors would show crew exactly how to access Mr B’s collection point.
13. Between then and the end of January 2021, the Council missed five further collections. It also collected Mr B’s bin from the collection point on one occasion but failed to return it.
14. Since February 2021, the Council has only missed one collection (in June) and it resolved this the next working day.

My findings

15. There were clearly significant issues with how the Council collected Mr B’s bins throughout 2020 and into early 2021.
16. The Council has explained why the collections were missed, and has set out the actions it took to resolve matters. I appreciate the difficulties the Council had; however, the fact remains that it failed to collect Mr B’s bins on at least 15 occasions over the course of a year (not counting separate reports from his neighbours). Five of those missed collections were after the Council put the collection point in place.
17. This was fault by the Council, which caused Mr B inconvenience and avoidable distress. It should take action to remedy this.
18. However, it is also clear that, after January 2020, the Council sorted out Mr B’s bin collection issues. Since then, there has only been one missed collection, which the Council resolved after Mr B reported it. This does not amount to an ongoing problem.
19. Because of this, it appears the Council has already fixed any systemic issues, and no further recommendations are required other than those addressing Mr B’s personal injustice.

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Agreed actions

20. The Council has agreed to write to Mr B and apologise for its repeated failure to collect his bins between February 2020 and January 2021. It has agreed to apologise for the inconvenience he was put to, and for his time and trouble in getting the matter resolved.
21. The Council has also agreed to make a payment of £100 to Mr B to recognise his injustice.
22. The Council has agreed to complete these actions within six weeks of this decision.

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Final decision

23. The Council was at fault for repeatedly failing to collect Mr B’s bins for almost a year. However, it has now fixed the problem and there have been no ongoing issues since January 2021. The agreed actions remedy Mr B’s injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman