Trafford Council (20 010 065)
Category : Environment and regulation > Refuse and recycling
Decision : Upheld
Decision date : 08 Feb 2022
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: The Council was at fault for missing some of Mr X’s assisted waste collections, and it did not always return his bins to the agreed location. This meant he had to report missed collections. The Council has agreed to apologise.
The complaint
- Mr X complains that, between July 2019 and January 2020, the Council missed waste collections and did not return his bins to the agreed collection point. The Council uses a private contractor to collect waste (which I refer to as ‘the Contractor’).
- Mr X says that, despite being on assisted collections, he had to pay his gardener to take his bins to and from the collection point. He says this created financial pressure and caused him avoidable distress.
- Mr X wants the Council to consistently collect his bins and return them to their correct position. He would also like the Council to compensate him for the distress and the uncertainty the missed collections have caused him.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- We investigate complaints about councils and certain other bodies. Where an individual, organisation or private company is providing services on behalf of a council, we can investigate complaints about the actions of these providers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 25(7), as amended)
- We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this report, we 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. We 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)
- 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)
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information from Mr X and the Council. Both parties had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.
What I found
What should have happened?
Household waste and recycling collections
- Councils have a duty to collect and dispose of household waste. They may specify when and where bins can be left for emptying. (Environmental Protection Act 1990, sections 45, 46 and 48).
- The Council collects food and garden waste weekly, and it alternates fortnightly collections of recyclable and non-recyclable waste. After waste is collected, the Council should return the empty bins either to their original location or to an agreed collection point.
Assisted collections
- The Council provides an assisted collection service to residents with disabilities or mobility problems. For these residents, the Council collects bins from wherever they are placed and returns the empty bins to the same location.
Reporting missed collections
- Residents should report missed collections within two working days. The Council will then arrange for a collection crew to return. If someone reports that a bin has not been returned, the Council will return it within 24 hours.
- If someone experiences repeated issues they can complain to the Council. The Council has a two-stage complaints procedure.
What happened?
- Mr X says he has been receiving assisted collections since 2018 (although the Council says this was only agreed in March 2020). The Council collected his bins from, and returned them to, the side of his house.
- In October 2019 Mr X contacted the Council and said it had not collected his bins. He then made a further six reports during the same month, saying the Council did not return to collect the bins.
- Between January and September 2020 Mr X reported a further three missed collections. He also said the Council failed to return his bins to the side of his house on four occasions.
- Mr X made complaints about his bin collections between September and November 2020. In response to each complaint, the Council apologised and said the Contractor would send a reminder to its crews for future collections. It also said it would monitor his collections.
- A supervisor monitored Mr X’s collections between October and December 2020. During this period, a collection crew had to return on two occasions.
- At around this time, The Contractor told the Council that it was unsafe for its crews to collect Mr X’s bins from the side of his house, because of a sloped lawn. It said this was a health and safety risk. The Council said this had not been raised as a problem when complaint responses were sent to Mr X. It said the Contractor should continue sending its crews to the agreed collection point until a new one could be agreed.
- The Contractor spoke to Mr X, who agreed that his bin collection point could be moved temporarily to his drive while he installed a path across his lawn.
- Mr X subsequently decided he could not afford to install the path.
- Mr X approached the Ombudsman in January 2021. He told us that, despite agreeing the alternative collection point, his bins were sometimes still left some distance away. This meant he had to pay his gardener (or ask his relatives) to bring them back.
- In April 2021 the Contractor agreed to install a path across Mr X’s lawn at its own expense.
- Mr X has not contacted the Council to report any problems with his bins since August 2021.
My findings
- Although the Council took steps to deal with reports of missed collections, there was a lack of clarity between the Council and the Contractor about why the Contractor was not collecting Mr X’s bins. Over a period of around a year, the Council failed to collect the bins on six occasions, and failed to return them to the agreed location on a further four.
- This was fault by the Council.
- The Contractor has now installed a path across Mr X’s garden at its own expense, and he has not reported any problems with his bins since August 2021. Because of this, there is no further action the Council needs to take to deal with the bin collections.
- However, Mr X had to spend some time reporting missed collections to the Council before the matter was resolved. The Council should apologise to recognise his time and trouble.
Agreed actions
- The Council has agreed to apologise to Mr X for the time it took to resolve his waste collection problems.
- This action should be completed within four weeks of this decision.
Final decision
- The Council was at fault for missing some of Mr X’s assisted waste collections, and it did not always return his bins to the agreed location. This meant he had to report missed collections. The agreed action remedies his injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman