Paying for services not rendered

Nathan

Nathan

SF VIP
Location
High Desert- Calif.
Right now I'm miffed that the trash company failed to pick up my residential trash bin this week. There have been a couple of other occasions in the last several months that trash pick up just wasn't done, on my road. I'm not one to complain, but I will be, starting tomorrow morning. If there was some kind of circumstance that prevented pick up, they could have informed customers via email, our electric company as well as internet provider both do that all the time.
I'm going to bend someone's ear tomorrow, either on the phone or in-person. I'm going to demand that a billing adjustment be made; if I failed to pay on time there would certainly be a late charge applied.
 

Nathan said:
Right now I'm miffed that the trash company failed to pick up my residential trash bin this week. There have been a couple of other occasions in the last several months that trash pick up just wasn't done, on my road. I'm not one to complain, but I will be, starting tomorrow morning. If there was some kind of circumstance that prevented pick up, they could have informed customers via email, our electric company as well as internet provider both do that all the time.
I'm going to bend someone's ear tomorrow, either on the phone or in-person. I'm going to demand that a billing adjustment be made; if I failed to pay on time there would certainly be a late charge applied.
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I agree.. we're paying for a service seperate to our council tax ( rates) here... and sometimes like yesterday we don't get our bins picked up either and it's infuriating give that the bins are not emptied (except for the food caddy, which is supposed to be emptied every week) ... for 3 weeks.... at a time...

yesterday was the turn for the food caddy and it wasn't picked up... as it is the food caddy is very small... it's the tiny one in the picture

South_Oxfordshire.jpg
and so really can't be left uncollected ... and we're warned not to put food in the other bins
 
Nathan said:
@hollydolly , what is the food caddy for, kitchen scraps and such? The bin I put out yesterday had several bags from the kitchen trash, they of course get stinky View attachment 450467and as such is a priority to get rid of, in my book.
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all food has to go into the Food caddy... that's for a whole week. I half fill it and I live on my own, so people with 6 in their household have a real problem if it's not picked up....

The other full size wheelie bins..we have 4 more... one for Cardboard and paper only.. another for mixed recycling... another for waste that can't be recycled... and yet another for garden waste.. grass and twigs etc.. they only get picked up one at a time every 3 rd week....

so..the food caddy , and the paper & cardboard one week... the food caddy and the mixed recycling the next week.. and so on....
 
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the only holidays our trash service is off is thanksgiving and christmas. the rest of the time they run. there for a while they kept not picking up our trash. i would call the next day and complain. they are now picking up like they're supposed to.
 
Our old trash service that we had for many years lost the contract. They were always sending a text & a voice mail if there was something going to be delayed. Not only for holiday reminders, but if something happened that they couldn't make it. If you didn't use one of their cans, you didn't have to pay for it. They were decent to deal with.

Last two months we have had to deal with a new company whose HQ is about 75 miles from us. We only used the recycle with the old company, but with the new one you have to pay (no opt out) for both a recycle wheeled bin & a trash wheeled bin. You also cannot opt out of the trash service at all.

We can lift the recycle into the truck without an issue, but the trash one is too heavy. The new bins are around 75 gal each. And neither of us are going to walk two bins down the driveway, especially in bad weather.

Hubby called the company & told them the trash bin was to heavy to lift into a truck when filled. He told her we are in a rural area with a 1000' gravel driveway & don't live in a paved neighborhood. She then offered to have the trash picked up at the house, which sounded nice at first, but said it be an additional monthly fee. We declined & told her to come & pick up the trash bin. Yes we still have to pay for it, but we can't use it & it's in the way sitting there.

We called & talked to the township secretary about the problems with their new contract that someone in that office agreed too. She admitted that those issues should have been addressed before accepting the contract. Basically, we are stuck with some one's decision who was too lazy to do their job.

Our neighbor next door said he has the same problem that we do & isn't happy. He talked to some other folks who said the same thing, but mostly were unhappy being charged for cans they didn't want or need.
 
I have 2 bins - one for recyclables and one for regular garbage and there are two separate trucks for them. They are usually pretty good, but sometimes one or the other is missed. They are usually picked up by 9 am, but I wait until after 1pm before calling. I am also miffed that customers aren't notified if the truck is running late or there is some other reason for a missed pick up. Usual things I'm told:
1) leave the bin out and we'll get to it a soon as possible.
2) The driver must be running late.
3) No explanation.
 
It's happened here too. Sometimes if I've called to complain, they returned to collect it. But trash collection is billed through my water bill, and if I'm late paying, or only make a partial payment, I'm charged a $10 late fee.

I'm wondering if there may be a county or state health department who might look into this. Stagnating trash feeds populations of pests like cockroaches and rats, which can damage property, degrade housing, contaminate food, and transmit diseases, endangering public health.
 
Imogene said:
Thankfully that is a problem I don’t have becasue there is no trash pickup service.

All the residents on my road carry our trash to the dump and it’s free.

So far it’s no big deal for me, as it’s just a hop-skip off the main highway, on my way to town.
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Property owners get a dump pass that's paid for through county property taxes. I take large amounts of stuff, like tree limbs or old appliances to the dump from time to time. I use the refuse pick up service for weekly rubbish as a convenience, but if I get ornery enough that may change.
 
Lilac said:
She then offered to have the trash picked up at the house, which sounded nice at first, but said it be an additional monthly fee.
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After my mom died and I called to change the trash service to my name, it turned out she had that service. But she must not have known that she had that, because I'd been taking it out to the road each week and when I was out of town she got a friend (or maybe it was her house cleaning lady) to come take it out to the street (300 ft of gravel driveway to get to the road).
 
This trash bin comes in blue for recyclable black for regular trash.

Toter ANA96-00BLU 96 Gallon Blue Rotational Molded Wheeled Rectangular Trash Can with Lid

96 gallon capacity for both supplied by Republic Services. Never in the entire time have we ever been able to come close to filling either one.
We could probably go 4 months without pickup before they would have enough to warrant needing picked up.

Without fail both are picked up every Saturday morning. Trash pickup bill is on auto pay @ $54.00 for every 3 months. This convenience is one less thing to think about.

For something like a failed water heater Republic Services has a depot where all you have to do is prove you are a customer & you can drop it off free of charge.
 
The trash in Spain is picked up every single night. In winter they get there early about 11pm... but in summer due to the massive increase in visitors aand tourists and the huge increase in garbage, they don't get to our street until around 2am...

When we first moved there, the noise of the bins being emptied woke me up from sleep.. but it only took me a few weeks to get used to it , then I never heard it again
 
jujube said:
I really can't say I have any complaints with our trash service. Trash is picked up twice a week and you can either put your bags in a bin or just set them out at the street. Recyclables are picked up once a week and yard waste pickup is once a week, too.

I think I'm lucky.
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I'd say you are too.. :)
 
Imogene said:
Thankfully that is a problem I don’t have becasue there is no trash pickup service.

All the residents on my road carry our trash to the dump and it’s free.

So far it’s no big deal for me, as it’s just a hop-skip off the main highway, on my way to town.
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We do that too however pick up is an option. We separate recyclables and our kitchen waste goes to the compost bin or the extra freezer in our garage. Any good lock type bags are recycled for bones and waste and stored in that small top freezer until trash day.
 
The city where my MIL lived did their own trash pick up. After she passed & we finished cleaning out the house & didn't need pick up anymore, I tried to cancel the service. It was about $25 a month for trash/recycle & we were paying for something we wasn't using at all. The lady said I could cancel, but the water would also have to be turned off in the house. I explained the circumstances, but it didn't matter & we ended having to pay to keep water.
 
Nathan said:
I'm going to bend someone's ear tomorrow, either on the phone or in-person. I'm going to demand that a billing adjustment be made; if I failed to pay on time there would certainly be a late charge applied.
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Yesterday evening I emailed the trash company's customer service, and aired my dissatisfaction, and made my demand that my account be credited for the missed week of service. I am awaiting their response...
 
Nathan said:
Yesterday evening I emailed the trash company's customer service, and aired my dissatisfaction, and made my demand that my account be credited for the missed week of service. I am awaiting their response...
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Good luck. By any chance did you have it set to where they need to acknowledge receipt of the email? I'm assuming that is still a thing someone can do.
 

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