Delivery of the new, larger garden waste bins to homes in Suffolk Coastal will start next week.

The council introduced paid-for garden waste collections in May this year.

One of the benefits of joining the Suffolk Coastal Garden Waste Scheme is that subscribers can get a free upgrade - receiving a larger (240 litre) green bin for their garden waste (the current brown organic waste bins in Suffolk Coastal are 140 litres).

These new bins come with the added attraction of being fitted with embedded, hi tech tags - radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags, to give them their official name. These can be “read” by a special device that the bin lorry crews will have, to ensure the right bins are emptied.

“We have had a very good response to the Garden Waste Scheme, with about 33,500 households (or about 57% of homes) signing up for the paid-for service,” explained Cllr Carol Poulter, Suffolk Coastal’s Cabinet Member with responsibility for the Green Environment.   

“Of these, 80% have opted to get the larger green bins, so delivering all the new bins is a huge logistical exercise.  We will then return at a later date to pick up any unwanted old brown bins, although people are welcome to keep them.”

The main delivery of the new larger green bins will start on Tuesday, 2 October. It is expected to take about a month to get round to all the homes that have currently opted in to receive a new green bin.

The rollout will be done area by area, starting in the Felixstowe area and working northwards through the District.  The on-line Suffolk Coastal bin collection day finder has been amended to give people a rough idea when the bins will be delivered in their area, see: http://apps.eastsuffolk.gov.uk/pages/bins/scdccollectiondays.aspx

As well as the embedded security tags, the bins will have an address/bar code sticker fixed to them. The address/barcode sticker is just temporary and will eventually come off in the weather - its purpose is purely to make delivering the bins to the correct address easier.

In future, refuse crews will be able to identify subscribed bins just by using a special device to “read” the embedded ID tag. In the event that a subscriber loses their bin or has it stolen, we are able to de-register the bin to take it out of service.  It means there is no incentive to would-be fraudsters to take someone else’s bin for their own use. The other benefits for the customer is the tags prove conclusively that people have paid for the service and links their bin to their individual property. 

In a separate operation, a team will return about a month laterto empty and pick up any unwanted brown bins. People will be informed when these pick ups are happening nearer the time.         

If you are already a member of the scheme and haven’t opted in yet, you can still change your mind.  We will continue to provide the upgrade bins, free of charge, to anyone who is eligible, even after the autumn rollout.  But there will be a delay to allow us to clear the backlog for those who have already opted in.

Anyone wanting to opt in, or with a query about the Suffolk Coastal Garden Waste Scheme, should contact customer services.

It is never too late to join the Garden Waste Scheme and still get 12 months worth of collections.   It’s quick and easy to sign up, too.  You can:

• Go online at: my.eastsuffolk.gov.uk/MyServices.  You will need to register, or login to, your My Eastsuffolk account and then complete the form for garden waste
• Call Customer Services on 01394 383789, and choose option ‘0’
• Or, pop in to see our Customer Service staff in the Customer Service Centre in Felixstowe and Woodbridge Library

You will need a debit or credit card to pay. The fee for each bin is £43 for a year (the equivalent of paying about £1.65 per fortnightly collection). You can place your order now and don’t forget to say ‘YES’ to the upgrade.

We will also be carrying out a phased ‘retro-fit’ of the security tags to brown bins, where people have joined the garden waste scheme but have not opted to have one of the new larger green bins. This is likely to happen towards the end of this year.

Brown Bins Can Be Re-used!

Local people are being urged to: ‘Be kind to the environment and re-purpose your brown bins’.

If you have not joined the Garden Waste Scheme, or if you have opted for a new green bin, and want to keep your old brown bin - you can.

Wheeled bins can be put to use in many different ways such as: tool stores, feed stores, water butts and compost bins, to name a few.  

Please consider whether you would like to keep your brown bins after the upgrade. You can tell us when you subscribe to the Scheme and we will let you know later when to present your unwanted brown bins for us to remove.

You can find more information about the Garden Waste Scheme, composting and re-purposing your old brown bin at www.eastsuffolk.gov.uk/SCDCgardenwaste

If you have an unwanted brown bin, look out for the special instructions that we will leave on your grey-lidded bin shortly.  The instructions will tell what to do and when to put your old brown bin out for us to take away.