Blue-lidded (recycling) bin

Blue-lidded bin contents

Please note: these pages are for domestic waste collections. For commercial waste please go to our commercial waste pages.

Your recycling bin is collected every fortnight - to find out when your collections are, please find your street in our directory.

Please put your bin out for collection by 7am at the kerbside with the handles facing the road.

Bins should be removed from the highway as soon as possible following collection (maximum 24 hours) and returned to your property.

Please note that your bins will not be collected if rubbish is compacted, bin lids can’t close or bins are too heavy to safely be collected. Please do not put plastic bags in your bin. If your bin has not been collected you should have received a bin tag informing you of the reasons why this has happened. If your bin has not been collected and you have not received a bin tag please visit the missed bins page to report it.

Email alerts

You can sign up for free email alerts for your street's collection via our bin collection calendar.

What can I put in my blue-lidded bin?

What can I put in my blue bin?
Yes please No thanks
  • aluminium foil
  • food and drink cans
  • glass bottles
  • newspapers and magazines
  • cardboard - toilet roll tubes
  • cereal boxes
  • junk mail
  • glass jars
  • drink cartons
  • aerosols
  • mixed paper and card
  • mixed glass
  • All household plastic bottles including milk bottles, detergent bottles, toiletry bottles and cleaning product bottles
  • All household plastic food trays including fruit or meat trays
  • All household food pots including yogurt and dessert pots
  • All household food tubs including fresh fruit and meat trays etc.
  • wallpaper
  • lightbulbs
  • broken glass
  • plastic film/bags
  • textiles, clothes and bedding
  • polystyrene
  • cookware such as pots and pans or Pyrex
  • general rubbish
  • shredded paper
  • Plastic plant pots
  • Black plastic
  • Nappies
  • Black bags
  • Food waste

Download a printable A4 guide to what you can put in your blue-lidded bin.

Please see the A-Z of rubbish and recycling if you are unsure of where an item should go.

Plastic carrier bags are made from a range of different plastics. The carrier bags can shred during the sorting process and end up in with the wrong type of plastic (contaminating the load). They can also become tangled around the sorting machinery which leads to further problems. Many larger supermarkets have recycling facilities for plastic bags.

Shredded paper is not suitable for recycling for a number of reasons including:

  • capture of the material (by its nature it is small and flies away when moved around making it difficult to capture during the sorting process, which for paper and card is largely done manually)
  • contamination of other materials (for reasons similar to capture)
  • the poor quality of the product (shredding makes the fibres of the paper damaged and unsuitable for future products)

We would advise residents to only shred the part of the document that contains personal/sensitive information and dispose of this in the green lidded bin, alternatively it can be used for animal bedding or home composting.

Customer Services

Open 9am–5pm Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays). If you do need to call us, please try to avoid our busiest times of lunchtime and early afternoon. Many queries relating to Council Tax, benefits or bin and bulky waste collections can be dealt with directly by logging into My Account.

Telephone: 08085 834333