Your responsibilities
As a landlord you must make sure that:
- the property has the correct number of bins for the people living there
- there is enough space for the bins
- your tenants use the recycling rubbish collections properly
- your tenants do not allow rubbish to accumulate in the garden
- when the property becomes vacant after the end of a tenancy, any remaining waste is disposed of safely and correctly as commercial waste.
Once the property becomes vacant, any waste items left behind are no longer considered household waste but commercial waste. By law, you must manage and dispose of your commercial waste responsibly. If you fail to do so you could be fined up to £50,000.
Your new tenants
We recommend that you give all new tenants information about recycling and rubbish collections. This can help to avoid problems for them, their neighbours and you.
You should provide this information early on in the tenancy, but not necessarily on day one when they may lose it due to the disruption of moving.
You should give your tenants printed copies of:
- the Welcome Letter for New Tenants
- what to put in each container
- their collection calendar (not available for flats with communal bins)
and tell them about:
- their collection day and frequency (weekly or fortnightly)
- where to put their bins and when
- the number of containers at the property
We also recommend that any bins are included in the inventory associated with the tenancy agreement.