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Rubbish collections

Portsmouth City Council offers a weekly rubbish collection service from your home (more frequent in some flats), a Special Bulky Waste Collection Service and a Household Waste Recycling Centre.

Your Recycling Centre

You can take much of the rubbish you can’t put out on your regular collection to the Port Solent HWRC – it’s FREE.  Call 023  9221 9819 to check they have space for hazardous rubbish like paint or asbestos.

Special Bulky Waste Collection

Can’t get to the recycling centre? Book a Special Collection with the Council on 023 9283 4092 or call a local waste company.  Remember – you must make sure that the person you give your bulky waste to will dispose of it legally – if not, you could be prosecuted.

Before you throw away…

Tips to help you to reduce the amount of rubbish you need to store each week:

• Buy refills and loose groceries
• Use re-usable shopping bags
• Recycle all your paper, card, plastic bottles and cans in your wheelie bin or green box
• Recycle  unwanted clothes, shoes, books etc in your local recycling bank – Over 50 at supermarkets and across the city
• Donate unwanted items to charities

Information for Portsmouth residents:

Your collection day - your rubbish is collected from your home every week via a black sack / dustbin collection service.  Put it out for collection by 7 am on your regular collection day (or after 7 pm on the previous evening). If your collection point is the public highway, please don’t put rubbish or recycling out at any other time – you’ll be breaking the law – and your collection crew won’t return until the next scheduled collection day.  To find out your collection day, click on 'Rubbish Collection Days', ask a neighbour, or contact the City Helpdesk.

Your collection point - is usually the front boundary of your property – your garden, forecourt or outside your own front door.   Some homes have a collection from the rear or the side of the property, but a front-of-property collection point is increasingly the norm.  Please don’t put your rubbish anywhere but your own waste collection point on collection day.

Storing your rubbish - you need to provide your own container to keep your rubbish secure, and keep it within your property during the week.  Please use either black sacks and/or dustbins. NB: the council does not offer an individual refuse wheelie bin collection service – if you use an individual wheelie bin to store rubbish at your home, please take out the sacks and put them at your collection point by 7am on collection day.  Please don’t use your recycling wheelie bin or box to store rubbish. Your collection crew can collect up to 5,000 sacks a day – so please make sure your filled rubbish sacks/dustbins aren’t over-heavy.  

If you live in a flat with shared bins - put your rubbish in the large bins in your waste storage area, or use the rubbish chute if you have one.  Your bins will be emptied at least once a week, and sometimes more frequently. Please don’t put bulky items in or around the bins.

If you miss your collection – store your rubbish within your property until your next scheduled collection day.  If your crew makes a mistake, let us know within 2 working days so that it can be put right.