Serviceteam took over Stroud's waste collection from SITA on April 2 2002. The SITA contract saw the waste management company collecting the district's waste and community recycler Resourcesaver subcontracted to carry out the recycling work. Serviceteam has reorganised the collections in a bid to reduce residents' concerns as the council had received complaints in the past about missed collections after Bank Holiday weekends.
Stroud District Council decided to remove Monday collections to try and end this problem. Collections still take place on the other week days but these now start at six o'c;lock in the morning and the refuse collectors have to complete their rounds before they finish. This means that they can often work at six or seven in the evening.
Previously, only residents living in the town of Stroud and the larger villages had kerbside recycling and it has now been rolled out to every household in the district. Serviceteam collects both householder's waste and their recyclables. Green recyclable boxes are collected on the same day as normal household refuse, but they are collected by a different crew and while the refuse is collected weekly, the recyclables are collected fortnightly.
Complaints
Although the new service was meant to alleviate residents' concerns, the council is still receiving a number of complaints about the service, especially over the change of collection days. Maggie Adderley, recycling officer for Stroud District Council, said: “At the moment we are having trouble collecting the recycling material. People knew they were getting recycling collections and so they saved up their recyclables.”
David Marshall, spokesman for Stroud District Council, admitted that there were some problems at the beginning of April although the refuse collection is now “sorted” and he expected the recycling problems to be resolved in the next few weeks.
Mr Marshall said: “You always get some problems if you make big changes. But we had 70% participation before and now 90% of households that can recycle are participating. Really it's a good news story and we have been caught out. More people are recycling than we ever thought would throughout the district. The scheme is popular because the recycling service is the same day as the refuse service and it sticks in people's minds.”
Serviceteam has been unavailable for comment.
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