Veolia excuses

Following on from the various discussions about Veolias' missed collections etc, I thought I would share with you some excuses they have come up with about the missed collections in my area.

But first I will just acquaint you with our housing circumstances which are somewhat different from most of yours. 

This road, Woodstock, has houses of mainly four floors and as such the vast majority of them are HMO's which include basement flats but almost all of them have very small front yards. This means that a building with four households would have eight bins in the tiny front yard. Putting eight bins in there would mean that only the front two could be used as the others wouldn't be accessible. We protested about the wheelie bins when they first came in and even more so when they announced their intention to not only double the amount but to increase the size of them as well.

But all that fell on deaf ears, they ignored us and landed us with these huge monstrosities that over filled our yards.

Before Christmas I noticed that an awful lot of our bins weren't collected. The crews came along but ignored many properties despite the overflowing bins. Each time (each week) I phoned Veolia and complained. Then I also started using the haringey.gov site to lodge a complaint. I also contacted my local councillor. 

I thought that their excuse would be the overflowing bins, lids not shut and things like that but it seems to go further than that.

I've just had a reply from my local councillor from which I will now quote Veolias' reasons for non collection:-

".... Woodstock Rd which are being investigated by Veolia’s Quality Health & Safety Officer. My understanding is that around the time of these missed collections, crew hands were not emptying bins that were, in their view, dangerous to move to the refuse vehicle due to the way it was presented for collection. Examples given included; bins placed on loose shingle, garden too small to safely manoeuvre the bins, uneven surface. The majority of issues were along Woodstock Rd, accounting for 38 properties with reported H&S issues for the refuse crew.

Veolia therefore arranged for the properties with alleged H&S issues to be visited on the morning of collection by staff who can move the bins to a place the crews can safely collect and empty. This is an interim measure to ensure residents receive a good collection service while Veolia investigate the H&S issue."  

(Why can't the dustmen do that themselves? Oh, and a place for safe collection, that'll be the pavement then?)

"It may be necessary to change some properties from wheelie bins to sacks, residents affected will be contacted by Veolia to discuss their needs and concerns when Veolia have compiled a detailed list of properties that may be affected."

I'm hoping do go on a walk-about with Veolia and my local councillor to try and understand all these sudden complexities that have occurred only in the last few months. One wonders how they coped previous months and years.