A Bolton Council error over collection dates, vehicle breakdowns and the festive hangover has helped create a 'perfect storm' affecting bin rounds - leading to more than 100 households still waiting to have their waste collected.

This has left residents frustrated with one saying he believed he would have to wait until the next collection for his bins to be emptied.

Dale Taylor, 50, a resident on Roscoe’s Court in Westhoughton, said his bins were not emptied last week adding he was told they would not be emptied until the next collection date.

The Bolton Council website stated they would be emptied within 48 hours, but he says he was told by a council representative that the waste collection truck would not be returning until the next collection date.

However after The Bolton News raised the issue his and other bins on the court were emptied this afternoon.

A Bolton Council spokesperson confirmed there was an error with the advertised date for recycling collections after the festive period.

All presented bins were emptied on Thursday, January 4, though the date was incorrectly advertised as Friday, January 5.

Dale said: “Our beige and burgundy bins were not collected on Friday, January 5, as per the schedule published on the Bolton Council website.

“Numerous residents on Roscoe’s Court logged this with Bolton Council on Friday by email and telephone.

 “According to the ‘missed bin collections’ list published online, there were 456 Streets on January 10 that were not serviced due to ‘operational service issues – return within 48Hrs’.

“Let us assume there is an average of 40 houses per street, 456 missed streets equates to 22,800 households across Bolton.

“As our bins have not been collected still, I called Bolton Council via telephone on the 10th, and have been informed that a decision has been made not to provide any return collections due to staffing and operational issues – I was told that this internal instruction was issued and is with immediate effect.

“The Bolton Council representative also informed me that they had taken over 2,000 phone calls in relation to missed bin collections across Bolton.

“Bolton Council stated that they will not be accepting any bin bags at the next collection in two weeks’ time due to their internal policy and instead residents are now being asked to use their local waste recycling centres.

“As I explained to the representative, due to Christmas, many residents’ bins are already completely full and even if some decided to store the waste for a further two weeks, it will take at least two more service collections to clear their backload.

“I feel it is unacceptable to ask many thousands’ of Bolton households to drive to their local waste recycling centres to manually deposit waste – not to mention the impact on the environment and sustainability, the additional strain this will put on your local waste recycling centres, and the inconvenience caused to thousands of residents, some of whom may not even have transportation or have health constraints.

“Bolton Council are not providing their customers and residents with the contracted services that we are paying for through council taxes and this can only be down to shambolic planning and lack of contingency and business continuity discussions.

“I was informed by the representative that there was no escalation process in place, I could complete an online complaint form but there was nothing that the Bolton Waste and Recycling Team could do as a formal decision had already been made not to reschedule any missed street collections.

“The website still incorrectly states that collections will be made in the next 48 hours and so I suspect pavements may also be hazardous as residents have left bins out expecting a collection and Bolton Council need to update their website providing clarity and guidance as a matter of urgency.

“Personally, to address the issue I would suggest Bolton Council agree to accept plastic bags at the next delivery as an exception to their policy, surely, we are doing more damage to the environment and causing further local disruption by driving thousands of cars through local waste recycling centres across all Bolton jurisdictions.

“A councillor emailed me back yesterday saying they are aware of issues and it's on agenda for discussion at town hall on January 17.

"My last collection was three weeks ago now and we're all already piling up waste into bags.

"Unless we drive to local waste and recycling centres, we're still going to have backlogs even after they empty the bins in two weeks time, at next visit.

"We're already full due to Christmas, I have cardboard coming out of my ears, and I've stood on the bin to get as much in as possible."

A spokesperson for Bolton Council said: “There was disruption to the normal waste collection service over the festive period as previously advertised but unfortunately this has been exacerbated due to vehicle breakdowns.

“In turn this has had a knock-on effect to this week’s collections.

“We have endeavoured to return to all missed streets, but due to the nature of not having the vehicle resources we require, some collections have been affected.

“Unfortunately, there was an error with the advertised date for recycling collections. All presented bins were emptied on Thursday 4 January though the date was incorrectly advertised as Friday 5 January.

“In response to this error, further resources were deployed on Friday 5 January to recover any outstanding collections.

“The next recycling collection is now the normal scheduled one on Monday 15 January.

“On the subject of our staff moving loose black bags of excess waste. Unfortunately, they are not permitted to manually handle loose, black bags in accordance with health and safety legislation due to sharps injuries etc.

“We do always promote the use of the local recycling centres for disposal of excess waste, whilst not always ideal, this is a viable option for many residents across the borough.”

If you have a story or something you would like to highlight in the community, please email me at chloe.wilson@newsquest.co.uk or DM me on X @chloewjourno.