Summary: Mr X complained about how the Council handled his waste collections. He stated on several occasions the Council failed to collect his bins, did not fully empty them, and did not return them to his property. The Council was at fault for several missed collections and for not fully emptying Mr X’s bins. It apologised to Mr X for the lack of service. We found the apology suitable to remedy Mr X’s injustice. The Council agreed to carry out further monitoring for two months to ensure Mr X’s bins are fully emptied.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about how the Council handled his weekly waste collections. He said the Council failed on several occasions to collect his bins, and repeatedly failed to fully empty them or return them to his property. He also said the Council wrongly recorded his complaints as service requests and failed to return his calls.
2. He wants the Council to provide the service he pays for, pay compensation, return his bin after collection, and fully deal with his complaints.

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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 significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. 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(1), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
6. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Relevant law and Council procedures

Waste and recycling collections

7. Councils have a legal duty to collect domestic waste and recycling from households in their areas. This duty is set out in the Environmental Protection Act 1990.
8. The Council’s website explains its responsibilities and how waste and recycling bins are collected in the area. Waste is collected weekly, with different bins emptied on a rotating schedule every week:
• Recycling garden waste and food waste (brown) – fortnightly collection
• Recycling paper and Cardboard (green) – collection every three weeks
• Other recycling waste such as glass bottles, jars (blue)– collection every three weeks
• Residual waste (grey) – collection every three weeks
9. The Council’s website allows residents to report missed collections via an online account. The Council says for any missed collections of:
• blue, green, or grey bins, the Council will send bags for use until the next scheduled collection. These bags will then be collected along with the bins; and
• brown bins, the Council will return within five working days.
10. The Council offers assisted bin collections for eligible residents who need help with moving their bins to accessible locations. The Council states if you have applied and are eligible, your bins will be collected from and returned to an agreed collection point near the home.

Residents bin collection advice – Bury Council

11. To ensure your bins are collected, place them out by 7am on collection day at the correct location (front for non-terraced houses, back for terraced houses, or the usual collection point), with handles facing the road, lids fully closed, and no overloading or unacceptable items inside. Keep bins accessible and free from obstruction by vehicles, then return them promptly after collection. For easy identification, label bins with your house number, and if you’re unsure of your collection point, follow your neighbours’ example. Assisted collections are available for those needing help, and you can also sign up for email reminders of collection days.

Complaints procedure

12. The Council has a three-stage complaint procedure:
13. The Informal complaint stage aims to resolve complaints quickly and efficiently. Routine service requests, such as a missed bin collection, are not complaints and should be handled as standard service requests. If received verbally by telephone call handlers must determine whether an issue is a complaint or a service request. If it is a complaint, call handlers should try to resolve it at first contact; if unresolved, it should be escalated to a line manager.
14. The stage one formal complaints are investigated by a senior manager and are acknowledged within five working days and results sent within 20 working days.
15. The stage two appeal stage is handled by an independent senior officer and the outcome is evidence-based and provided within 28 days.
16. Any delays will be communicated with an estimated completion time.

What happened

17. Mr X lives in a residential street and the Council collects waste from an alley at the back of his property. Mr X explained the Council previously used lorries that entered the alley behind his property However, crews now collect bins manually pulling them to the top of the alley where the lorry waits and often leave them there once emptied requiring residents to collect the bins to return to their properties.
18. His weekly collection is on Fridays, meaning he must leave his bin out from Thursday night or early Friday. If a collection is missed, residents are asked to report it the next working day – Monday in Mr X’s case. The Council will then return within five days for garden or food waste. Mr X believes this leaves his bin unattended in the back alley for long periods, increasing the risk of it being lost or damaged, and he said he would be financially liable for replacing it.
19. In October 2024 Mr X phoned the Council asking the call handler to log a complaint. He did not report a specific service failure at the time but stated the Council had failed to collect bins from his street on multiple occasions and that the Council is often late collecting his bins. The Council did not log a complaint but instead only recorded Mr X’s call. There is no record showing which actions the Council took following this report.
20. In January 2025 Mr X contacted the Council again reporting he was unhappy as his green bin was not returned to the property. He also reported the Council only half emptied his grey bin and repeated he wanted to raise a formal complaint which the Council did on this occasion.
21. In the Council’s complaint response the Council confirmed it investigated the matter and addressed it with the waste collection crew stressing the importance of the team fully emptying the bins. It stated an operational supervisor would monitor the next collection date ensuring his bins were fully emptied.
22. A week following the Council’s complaint response, in early February Mr X reported the crew had left the green bin at the top of the road and not returned it to his property. He requested a call back from a supervisor and escalated his complaint to the next stage of the Council’s complaint procedure.
23. The Council responded to Mr X at stage two of the complaint procedure response in March. The Council apologised for the lack of service Mr X had received in relation to the bin collections. The Council further said it had monitored his collections for the last two weeks and will continue to monitor his collections for the next two weeks ensuring his bins are fully emptied.
24. The Council stated that the waste operations supervisor had tried to visit Mr X in person. However, Mr X said his doorbell camera showed no record of any missed visitors at his address.
25. Mr X remained unhappy with the Council’s response as he had asked for additional points to be added to his complaint such as missed call backs he requested and the Council only raising them as informal complaints. He said the Council failed to address these new points in its stage 2 complaint response.
26. Mr X remained unhappy and complained to us.
27. During our enquiries, Mr X explained he is aware the Council provides assisted collections for eligible residents. He said he does not believe he qualifies for this service but has observed that bins from neighbouring properties with assisted collections are often returned to their locations, while his is not.
28. He further said he is frustrated with the Council’s service and lack of clarity it provides relating to how it logs and responds to service requests versus complaints. He said he would continue to raise complaints until the Council updates its policy on complaint handling and its waste collection.

My findings

Waste collection

29. The Council investigated Mr X’s reports of missed collections and his bins not being fully emptied. The Council accepted it had missed some collections and had not fully emptied the bins. This was fault. It carried out monitoring but records show the issue has continued with Mr X reporting further missed/partial collections in May and June 2025. It has apologised for the lack of service which is suitable to remedy any past injustice caused to Mr X. I have recommended the Council carry out further monitoring of Mr X’s waste collections below.
30. Mr X also complained the waste crew failed to return his bin to his property but instead left it at the top of the alley. Mr X does not have an assisted collection agreement and the Council’s waste website says customers should collect and return bins to their properties as soon as possible after collection. In Mr X’s case, the bins do not appear to be left more than 20 metres from his property, therefore the injustice is not significant. If Mr X considers this distance too far and he meets the eligibility criteria, then it is open for him to apply to the Council for assisted collections. There is not enough evidence of fault.

Complaint handling

31. The Council operates a three-stage complaints procedure and instructs its staff to try to resolve issues at the first point of contact. Similarly, if a resident raises a service request, the expectation is that the matter will be addressed immediately where possible.
32. Although seeking to resolve residents’ concerns at first contact is a reasonable approach, it can create confusion for call handlers when deciding whether to log a matter as a formal complaint or to treat it as a service request. This is what happened in Mr X’s case, where his attempts to raise complaints were incorrectly recorded as service requests. On balance, it was clear Mr X was asking for his concerns to be logged as a complaint. Not doing so was fault and caused a delay in the matter being formally responded to.

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Agreed Actions

33. Within one month of the final decision the Council agreed to:
1. apologise to Mr X for the frustration caused when it failed to log his concerns about bin collections as a formal complaint. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The Council agreed to consider this guidance in making the apology I have recommended.
2. Remind relevant officers to decide whether residents are making service requests or complaints. Officers should register formal complaints when asked to do so.
34. Within two months of the final decision the Council agreed to monitor Mr X’s bin collections to ensure they are both collected on the appropriate days and fully emptied.
35. The Council agreed to provide us with evidence of the above,

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Decision

36. I completed this investigation finding fault which caused Mr X an injustice. The Council agreed to take actions remedying this injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman