Garden waste – Abingdon on Thames Town Council

Please see the below from Vale of White Horse District Council: 2 August 2021

Garden waste – Vale of White Horse District Council (whitehorsedc.gov.uk)

Dear Garden Waste customers,

We have taken the difficult decision to suspend our garden waste collections.

As you may already be aware, waste collection services right across the country have been suffering from disruption over the past few weeks. This has been the case in South Oxfordshire too.

The national and local disruption is due to the ongoing issues of a shortage of HGV drivers, as a result of the pandemic and Brexit, who are needed to drive our waste collection vehicles. We also have a number of waste collection staff who are required to self-isolate by the government’s Track and Trace system.

The situation does not look likely to improve in the next few weeks and so with a heavy heart we have decided to suspend the garden waste service for a month to allow the crews to prioritise food waste, recycling and general waste collections. This approach is in line with government guidelines on the prioritisation of waste collections. We hope to be able to reinstate the service after a month and we will review the situation towards the end of August before providing an update.

We hope to be able to reinstate the service after a month and we will review the situation towards the end of August before providing an update.

We are confident that we can honour our commitment to provide a minimum of 20 collections a year for this paid for service. In normal years, we provide more collections than this partly thanks to our extra-large garden waste collections in the Spring and Autumn. We don’t envisage this year being any different, so nobody should be out of pocket.

We will let you know as soon as we are in a position to restart the service. We will keep you updated via these garden waste pages on our website and our social media sites.

If you would like to dispose of your garden waste you can take it to one of Oxfordshire County Council’s Household Waste Recycling Centres if you’re able – you can check the county council’s website for opening times. Or if you’d rather, you can wait until the garden waste service resumes and we’ll take it then.

Please note that we are not taking on any new garden waste customers at this timeand we will review this again when the situation with the service changes. We will continue to deliver bins to households who have already signed so that you are able to start using the service once it is restarted.

We are extremely sorry for the inconvenience and we are working hard with Biffa to try and resolve these issues and reinstate the service as soon as is possible.

Account Queries

Please email gardenwaste@southandvale.gov.uk with your name, address and customer ID if you need us to action any of the following

Moving house
Cancelling your account
To order an additional bin
If you have a query about your annual invoice

Will I get money back or extra collections for the weeks when garden waste collections do not take place?

We normally provide more collections than is set out in the agreement – typically we provide 25 collections per year along with the double collections on the extra garden waste weeks in Spring and Autumn, and so even with the pause to the service at the start of the year, we are confident we can provide the minimum of 20 collections this year.

Home Composting

For more information about home composting and purchasing a compost bin please visit Oxfordshire Recycles.

What happens to your garden waste

Your garden waste is recycled outside using a process called Open Windrows and the end product is sold to local farmers. We only accept garden waste in our brown bins. This means no packaging not even compostable packaging. As the process happens outdoors, packaging of any kind presents a litter issue.

Anyone who is not a garden waste customer can dispose of garden waste at one of Oxfordshire County Council’s Household Waste Recycling Centres. These sites are open but please check their website for opening times and any restrictions, particularly COVID-19 restrictions.