User Pays On-Call Kerbside Clean Up
This service allows households, who pay for a Council waste service, up to 1m3 (1m wide x 1m high x 1m deep) or 100kg of household items, to be collected from their property.
The fee for this service can be found here.
Accepted items include:
- Small indoor and outdoor furniture (no glass or mirrors accepted)
- Toys and sporting goods
- Whitegoods (except fridges, freezers and air conditioners. Stoves – must be dismantled ie. doors removed)
- Small rugs and carpet scraps (must be less than 1m length)
- Scrap metal.
Items that are not accepted include:
- Fridges, freezers and air conditioners
- Glass or mirrors (sheet, pane, glass top tables etc.)
- Household garbage, food scraps or garden waste
- Asbestos, hazardous materials or chemicals (chemicals can be disposed of at the NSW EPA Household Chemical Clean Out
- Paints, oils, batteries, gas bottles, extinguishers, smoke detectors, Fluro globes
- Building materials, demolition/renovation (bricks, concrete, tiles, sinks, baths, gyprock, fence palings and roof sheeting, etc.)
- E-waste (televisions, computers and peripherals, printers etc)
- Tyres
- Mattresses – can be disposed of at the Household Bulky Waste Drop Off Event
- Bean bags.
Frequently asked questions
Can I book a User Pays On-Call Clean Up more than once?
Only one (1) booking only per household per financial year.
Why do we now have to pay?
The true cost to provide this service is significantly more than the fee that you are charged.
It includes the costs of safety measures, collection vehicles, staff to collect the materials, and administration staff to process bookings and disposal fees.
For households that use the service, the remaining cost is funded from the Domestic Waste Management Charge applied to annual rates.
How can I find second hand goods if people aren't placing piles on the kersbide?
At our Household Bulky Waste Drop Off Event, which is held twice a year, March and September (refer to your waste calendar for dates), our Up4Grabs area is open to all registered participants.
Participants have the opportunity to rummage through the Up4Grabs area and take as much as they want, for free.
This provides a safer environment for picking up second hand goods, rather than looking through bulky waste on the side of the road.
If you don’t have any materials to drop off at Household Bulky Waste, the Up4Grabs area will be open to the general public for one week after the event.
Our former scheduled clean up service allowed residents to put items on the kerbside up to 1 week beforehand.
This created mess within the streets and attracted illegal dumping.
Leaving bulky waste on the kerbside creates safety risks for our staff who collect the materials, and the public who are looking through the piles.
How do we ensure no one takes advantage of our paid service and adds to our pile?
You must book and pay to receive a User Pays On-Call Clean Up.
When you book our Waste Services team will let you know of the collection day. They will also ask you to itemise the materials you want to place out for collection.
Place items out by 6am on your advised collection day, and no more than 24 hours before.
By placing items out within 24 hours of the collection it will minimise the chance of people adding to your pile.
Itemising items means our Waste Services team will have a record of the items you have declared.
Any ineligible items will be treated as an illegal dumping matter, will be recorded and form part of our ongoing evaluation of this service.
What if I don't have a way of bringing my items to the Household Bulky Waste drop off?
Bookings for the Household Bulky Waste event are registered by the property rather than the resident.
If you, as the householder, don’t have the means to drop off materials yourself, you can have a neighbour, friend or family member drop them off on your behalf.
You just need to make sure a booking is made under your property address.
Then the person dropping off your material must bring proof of residency for that property ie. a rates notice.
I'm a pensioner. Can I get a reduced rate?
A 50% subsidy already applies to the User Pays service, so further rebates aren't possible.
However, if you are a pensioner and you haven't done so already, you can apply for a rebate on your annual rates.
Isn't illegal dumping going to increase now?
With the introduction of the User Pays On-Call Clean Up, and having two (2) Household Bulky Waste Drop Off events each year (September and March), residents will have more options to dispose of their unwanted household items.
We hope that this will see a reduction in illegal dumping cases.
Should you spot any illegal dumping please report it.
What is the difference between the User Pays On-Call Clean Up and the Household Bulky Waste?
The User Pays On-Call Clean Up is restricted to 1m3 or up to 100kg total weight.
No Community Recycling Centre materials, mattresses, or items that cannot be safely picked up by one person will be accepted.
Our Household Bulky Waste event allows 2m3 or up to 200kg total weight.
At our Household Bulky Waste event you can drop off:
- up to 2 mattresses per household (in addition to the 2m3 limit)
- large items of furniture including lounges, tables, wardrobes etc.
- materials eligible for the Community Recycling Centre such as televisions, computers, paints, etc.
After you drop off materials, you are welcome to visit our Up4Grabs area.
This area is full of pre-loved items that are still in reusable condition.
Take as much as you like, free of charge.
What's the difference in safety between a free scheduled service and a paid on-call service?
While there's no difference between the types of materials accepted for collection, the User Pays On-Call Clean Up is a more controlled system.
The free scheduled service used to run during March and was open to all urban residents.
It meant approximately 10,000 residents were putting their bulky waste on the kerbside at the same time.
With the User Pays On-Call Clean Up being on a needs basis, collection is spread out and based on demand rather than being confined to 1 month.
We are able to cap the number of bookings to a maximum of 10 per day rather than 400 per day.
This will minimise the potential injury to staff from repetitive heavy lifting.
The booking system also allows our staff time to discuss the service and the resident’s responsibilities.
Residents are required to disclose the materials that will be placed out, and this helps us to better prepare for the collection.
Why is Household Bulky Waste recognised as a better service to handle bulky waste?
Items dropped off at our Household Bulky Waste can be sorted and placed into dedicated bays for recycling or disposal.
Reusable materials go into our Up4Grabs area. These are free for people to take, and results in a higher resource recovery rate.
All items (except steel) placed out for collection for the User Pays On-Call Clean Up, go to landfill.
These materials do not get recycled or reused.
Why not do tipping vouchers like other Councils?
Our municipality no longer has its own landfill, so our garbage is sent to a neighbouring Council for disposal.
We did consider tipping vouchers, however the landfill operator advised it wasn't possible due to the administrative resources needed.
For example, knowing the weight of your waste can be difficult. If you took what you thought was 100kg worth of waste to the landfill with your voucher but exceeded the 100kg limit, you'd be required to pay the excess.
Why was the scheduled kerbside clean up replaced?
It was replaced due to:
- staff and public safety
- injuries sustained by staff and damage to property
- low resource recovery rate
- negative impact on kerbside aesthetics.