The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: Mr X complained the Council has repeatedly failed to collect the household waste and recycling from all properties on his road on the scheduled days or within a timely period when collections are missed. This has led to an unsightly accumulation of waste on the street. The Council’s repeated failure to collect Mr X’s household waste and recycling is fault. This fault has caused Mr X an injustice.
The complaint
The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr X complained the Council has repeatedly failed to collect the household waste and recycling from all properties on his road on the scheduled days or within a timely period when collections are missed. This has led to an unsightly accumulation of waste on the street.
Mr X also complains the Council has failed to adequately respond to his complaints or address his concerns.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
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) 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(i), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
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; Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.
What I found
Refuse and recycling collections 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.
The Council's practice is to make a weekly household waste collection and a fortnightly recycling collection.
When a resident reports a missed collection, the Depot will ask the crew to return to complete the round as soon as possible. When the Council has completed the collection, it closes the report.
What happened here Mr X says that over the last 12 months the Council has routinely collected household waste and recycling from only half of his street. Waste from houses on the other half of the street, including Mr X’s is left uncollected. This leads to an accumulation of waste on the street as the Council does not return to collect it before the next scheduled collection.
Mr X is disappointed that despite reporting missed collections and making complaints the problem has continued.
According to the Council’s records Mr X has reported five missed household waste collections and two missed recycling collections in the last 12 months. The Council’s records also show that a significant number of other properties on Mr X’s street have reported missed collections over the last 12 months. Mr X’s reports are all closed which indicates the Council has since made the missed collections. However, the dates these reports were closed are inconsistent and do not suggest the Council made the collections in a timely manner. The records also suggest the Council also missed other collections.
For example, Mr X reported a missed household waste collection on 17 November 2021, which the Council closed on 6 December 2021. This would suggest the Council also missed the collections scheduled for 23 and 30 November 2021. If it had made these collections it could have closed the report much sooner.
Similarly, Mr X reported a missed collection on 1 June 2022, which the Council closed on 22 June 2022. Again, had the Council made the intervening scheduled collections it could have closed this report weeks earlier.
There are also discrepancies in the reports of missed recycling collections. Mr X reported a missed recycling collection on 25 January 2022, which the Council closed on 14 February 2022. This suggests the next collection, scheduled for 8 February 2022 was also missed.
In addition to reporting missed collections, Mr X also made a formal complaint to the Council. In June 2022 Mr X complained his household waste and recycling collections were constantly missed. He noted they were initially told the collections were missed due to COVID19 but now just received empty apologies and no resolution. He provided the reference numbers for eleven missed collections reported since July 2021. Mr X said he had also reported additional missed collections via Twitter but had not received references for these.
Mr X asked the Council to explain why only half the road had regular waste collections and what would be done to resolve this. The Council’s response explained there were widespread staff shortages in the waste services division and in collection crews. It said most collections were being made on the scheduled days but some collection rounds had been impacted by the shortages. The Council suggested Mr X leave his bin out if a collection was missed as catch up crews were operating.
Mr X was not satisfied with the Council’s response and asked for his complaint to be reviewed. The Council’s review response was similar to its initial response and again referred to the problem of staff shortages. It told Mr X there were plans in place to ensure he did not experience repeated missed collections going forward. And it apologised for the lack of service Mr X had received.
The Council did not provide any details of the plans to improve the service, but its records show the depot added Mr X’s property to a monitoring schedule. The depot noted the rounds servicing Mr X’s street were not often dropped so there was no reason for repeated missed collections.
As the problem of missed collections has continued, Mr X has asked the Ombudsman to investigate his complaint. He does not accept the missed collections are due to COVID 19 or staff shortages. Crews are available to visit his street, but only collect the waste from half the properties. Mr X also notes the Council collects his garden waste as scheduled without fail.
In response to my enquiries the Council states the depot suffered significant staffing shortages throughout early and mid-2022. This led to a number of rounds being dropped with collections happening on the weekend or subsequent week. It says it has now taken a number of steps which have largely relieved the situation. The majority of collections now occur on the scheduled day or no later than 24 hours afterwards.
The Council states much of the delay in providing a remedy was due to a national shortage of suitable qualified drivers and some local management issues.
Analysis It is clear from the Council’s records that it has repeatedly failed to collect Mr X’s household waste and recycling. These failings in the service amount to fault.
The Council states Mr X has reported a total of eleven missed collections, but I consider it likely the Council missed significantly more collections. There are inconsistencies in the Council’s records, and Mr X’s complaint gives references for reports of missed collections that are not included in the records provided by the Council.
I do not therefore consider the Council’s records are a reliable reflection of the extent of the missed collections, or when it actually collected the household waste and recycling.
I also consider there to be fault in the way the Council responded to Mr X’s complaints. I recognise the Council may have had operational difficulties and staffing shortages, but that does not explain why half Mr X’s street had missed collections. There were collection crews available to collect the household waste and recycling from Mr X’s street, and the depot confirmed Mr X’s rounds were not often dropped. The generic nature of the Council’s responses suggests the Council had not properly investigated Mr X’s complaint.
It is unclear whether the Council did monitor Mr X’s collections following his complaint in July 2022. The Council has not provided records of any monitoring. If it did, this does not appear to have been effective in resolving the issue as Mr X has reported further missed collections.
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 and recycling left at his property. As the missed collections affect half of the street Mr X has also had to endure large amounts of uncollected waste on his street, which is untidy and unpleasant.
He has also experienced frustration and disappointment, both with the missed collections and the Council’s failure to resolve the problem. Mr X has been put to unnecessary time and trouble in trying to resolve this matter.
Agreed action
The Council has agreed to apologise to Mr X and pay him £250 in recognition of the frustration and difficulties the repeated failure to make regular household waste and recycling collections has caused.
The Council has also agreed to arrange to monitor Mr X’s household waste and recycling collections for eight weeks to identify any reasons for the failure in the service and to ensure the collections are carried out properly The Council should carry out this action within one month of the final decision on this complaint and should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.
Final decision
The Council’s repeated failure to collect Mr X’s household waste and recycling on the scheduled days is fault. This fault has caused Mr X an injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman