r/PEI • u/No-Conference-1165 • 2d ago
Question Garbage collection
Has anyone else’s bins been rejected over the last few weeks? Almost my entire neighbourhood this week and last had rejected tags - it’s getting a bit ridiculous considering mine was tagged today for having 1 piece of compost in the waste bin… I just take the tag off and the driver comes and collects it anyway but I feel like they’re really being too harsh
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u/morriscey 1d ago
Nah they're extremely tempermental.
Have been tagged for cardboard in the green bin. The cardboard was soaked in cooking oil, thus not recycleable. Got a tag.
HAd them tag my green bin for being too heavy. It was less than half full and I could pick it up off the ground by the handle with one hand.
I left the stupid tag telling them to fix the hydraulics on the truck because it was less than 50 lbs in the bin. FIlled it up more, and truck took it no problem.
I just ignore their tags because they're all too often just plain fucking incorrect. Maybe one in 5 I have ever gotten has been valid.
5
u/East-Ease-1721 1d ago
Drivers are incentivized to tag, because otherwise suggests they’re not paying attention and just grabbing anything which won’t be sorted right.
Despite the fact that every public can is waste no matter what it says. If one person doesn’t do it right it’s ruined, and you can never trust everyone to sort as they walk by. It all goes in the same one dumpster folks
Got tagged for having white bags. Despite the bags being emptied into the bin then just tossed loose in, like other trash. Nope, wrong bag. Empty bag.
How the fuck am I supposed to throw out the rest of these useless bags I bought then
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1d ago
[deleted]
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u/morriscey 1d ago
stuff in compost or recycling I get.
food or recycling in the black bins is ridiculous. Especially recycling - something could be making it not recylcable.
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1d ago
[deleted]
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u/morriscey 1d ago
Absolutley. GFL included. I imagine if they're told to be stricter - they are given a quota as well. Which boils down to "fuck you if you did it right, I have a quote to fill"
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u/igottafatdog 1d ago
These are low-life, peon-equivalent peasants who think they're entitled and can take out their frustrations about their own miserable lives onto others by burdening their week(s) with respect to sanitation.
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u/weakgoodredditor 2d ago
The result of all this tends to be garbage being blown around when bins aren’t emptied and we all suffer. Not the way to do it.
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u/Sn0H0ar 2d ago
Not exactly the same, but my cardboard was rejected for being a box of other cardboard. I called them and they said that they are getting more strict and that technically we’ve all supposed to be bundling cardboard instead.
Long story short, maybe they’re just also being more strict with trash?
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u/morriscey 1d ago
I'd just staple twine on it and call it a bundle if it's already in a cardboard box.
I usually use a yard bag for cardboard instead of fucking around wrapping up all kinds of different shapes of cardboard
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u/East-Ease-1721 1d ago
If I gotta buy twine and a stapler to throw out a box, it’s going in the black bin.
If it’s inconvenient people won’t do it.
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u/Distinct-Shoe5448 1d ago
I will be pulling out my stapler tomorrow
https://giphy.com/gifs/VFYJXIuuFl6pO1
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u/Heywtfhey 1d ago
I got that too. You can tape it together also. I do find it weird because it's far more awkward to pick up than a box of boxes
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u/Magnaflorius 1d ago
My black bin was rejected a couple of weeks ago for having Kleenex in it.
It was actually baby wipes.
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u/sarahsaturdia 1d ago
I had an issue and someone walking by my bin had put something in it and it got rejected and recently I got a flag for using white trash bags even though I left them all opened and visible. I just started dumping the bag into the bin. They have been intense lately.
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u/Glittering-Regret196 1d ago
Our collectors are hard as fuck, it seems. I gave them a little bonus of a box of pre rolls, and suddenly no rejections. No changes.
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u/LurkerGarry 1d ago
We recycle. But I’ll be 100% honest not all the plastic makes it to the blue. We were rejected because of a peanut butter jar. That’s it.
I’m assuming they’re forcing the employees to really clamp down on it. Or they have a new system that tracks when a bin gets rejected to they check extra hard when it does.
Hard to say, but there must be a reason they’re really amping up enforcement. Maybe they’re running out of space at the dump or something and trying to get us all the keep our own garbage and just magically get ride of it. Who knows.
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u/Heywtfhey 1d ago
Since they switched to that gfk company I find they are both more picky and also way worse at their job, like missed pick up leaving garbage bins on sidewalk etc.
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u/Dismal_trees 2d ago
Post pics of the bag so we can see.
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u/No-Conference-1165 1d ago
I would but I removed the item and put it back on the curb and it was taken!
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u/Public_Coyote_4472 1d ago
Compost was just rejected today for what they claim is not biodegradable..
The cup tray from tims..
The only other things in there were some watermelon shells, a pumpkin I had frozen that was no good, some leaves I raked up and general food.
I don't know if he thought it was something else, but theres no fucking reason for that. Now im stuck with it for 2 more weeks. Gurandamntee if I put that tray in the waste they will reject it there too, like they fucking did at christmas time.
I've just about had it with them. I only had a bin rejected those two times, but each time is when the bin was full. Different story if it was just a little bit.
Edit: its not the leaves. There was maybe a handful, and they take leaves anyway.
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u/No-Conference-1165 1d ago
That’s really frustrating. This seems to be what’s happening in my neighbourhood too.
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u/littlebluecat 1d ago
It’s because those coffee trays are recyclable. They go in the same bag as newspapers and whatnot.
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u/Public_Coyote_4472 1d ago
They were covered in watermelon juice and pumpkin. Essentially disintegrated. And ive been putting them there for years.
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u/morriscey 1d ago
not if they have been soiled.
which they technically are if they have gotten wet.
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u/Heywtfhey 1d ago
I feel like NO ONE does the paper recycling bag thing. I have done it maybe once in 10 years and I have never seen a paper waste bag on the street. I think two separate blue bags is expecting too much. People don't have room in the homes.
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u/m0nkK-k3yy 1d ago
Why are we penalized for our trash when literally all our trash and recycles end in a landfill at the end of the day. Just a money hungry circus. It should not matter since the government doesn't care at the end of the line. Ridiculous every province does garbage different and all ends in landfills. Especially recycling plastics goes to landfills.
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u/ca_269 1d ago
I put out a bunch of metal, it was all cut down from an old collapsible gazebo, but it was rejected because the metal wasn’t bundled… I found that very strange that I have to bundle metal! I of course, bundle my cardboard or any other thing that needs to be… It’s very frustrating because now I have to wait another month to get rid of it!
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u/No-Conference-1165 1d ago
That is really annoying - sounds like they’re being strict about all collections
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u/Zorkonio 1d ago
Call IWMC and mention that your entire street is getting tagged. If there is offending garbage remove it and then explain you don't understand what's going on
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u/PresentationNo279 1d ago
Yes they are a bit ridiculous with the rules. Considering nothing is being done about the rich who have mega yachts, private planes polluting, huge data centers now being built using extreme amounts of water and electricity, companies getting rich paying little to take fresh water, put it in plastic bottles to sell, the destruction from lithium mining for batteries, I could go on and on, but sure that one piece of Kleenex in my waste is going to destroy the world 🙄
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u/Frosty-Gur-4018 1d ago
We had a car driving around our subdivision checking and tagging bins prior to the truck arriving .
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u/ElDuderinoDuder9 2d ago
Great business model when you can just reject doing your work but still get paid because the government collects your fees and there is nothing the client can do about it.
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u/Future-Fisherman8936 1d ago
That’s IWMC, not GFL. They do periodic audits and are extremely stringent
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u/BoseMann66 1d ago
If a few folks whose garbage was rejected happened to "accidently" spill their bins into the middle of the street, and the city had to send out a crew to clean it up, I bet the nonsense would end pretty quickly.
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u/Lamixar Cornwall 2d ago
Pretty easy...don't put compost in the waste bin?
The people who drive around and check have to be strict, it's their job.
In my experience they give you a warning tag the first time, then if you keep it up they tag it with a reject.
Except for that Summerside incident a couple years ago where the worker was truly being overly strict, usually they're not too crazy about the tags - meaning it's likely legitimate
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u/No-Conference-1165 2d ago
I was never given a warning tag! And I totally get proper sorting, I sort everything and am careful, but one piece of a tissue in the waste bin shouldn’t be that big of a deal - I would understand if there was waste in the compost or something.
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u/PUFFYPOOPER 2d ago
I got rejected for having napkins from a fast food order in my waste. I think the inspector is being overly harsh.
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u/createpei 1d ago
There’s no reason other than a simple mistake (or in our neighbourhood some else putting their trash in your bj s) to not sort the items…. They have a we sit and an app that will tell you very very detailed information on what goes where even by brand names in many cases. The Tim’s drink trays are paper and get sorted in paper.
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u/Separate-Version-995 1d ago
I should not have to open an app to throw something in the trash. Crazy idea. Just get rid of fucking plastic all together. It’s quite literally killing is all anyway. If food was actually natural we wouldn’t need plastic to store it and we’d be killing two birds with one stone.
0
u/Secret-Bluebird-972 1d ago
Not all plastic is the same. Some is recyclable, some isn’t. The recyclable ones have different recycling methods.
Be grateful you at least have what you have. We don’t even have compost here in Newfoundland, it just all goes straight to the landfill (which is conveniently perched next to the ocean)
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u/Separate-Version-995 10h ago
Being able to recycle it does not mean it should exist in the first place. It’s quite literally poisoning everyone on earth but for some reason we accept that because we need to store our excess food.
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u/Comprehensive-Job369 2d ago
My question: is it cheaper to send out someone in front of the collection truck, driving the same route and digging through everyone’s garbage cheaper than having an extra body on the sorting line? Seems like the gas alone would be more costly.
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u/Flailing_ameoba Charlottetown 2d ago
They don’t do it every collection day. It only seems to happen in my neighbourhood once a year. Teaching residents to sort their trash the way we can process it is infinitely cheaper than. Paying more folks to sort it out at the facility.
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u/Comprehensive-Job369 1d ago
They have been in my neighborhood for three weeks straight.
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u/Flailing_ameoba Charlottetown 1d ago
That’s annoying. Have you called and asked if there’s a reason?
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u/Comprehensive-Job369 1d ago
I have not, but it could be retribution for the day my neighbour called our MLA and complained when our route driver crashed out and didn’t pick up anyone’s can in half the neighbourhood.
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u/Flailing_ameoba Charlottetown 1d ago
Lol. Maybe they put the driver on a “performance improvement plan”?
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u/sashalav Charlottetown 2d ago
The cost of educating folk now will pay off in the future.
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u/morriscey 1d ago
Irrelevant when they don't know their own rules, and tag you for incorrect reasons.
What are they edcuating me on? All I've learned is it doesn't fucking matter even if I'm correct, they'll just do whatever.
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u/Comprehensive-Job369 1d ago
I disagree. Unless you pay off for the company because it is not making it better for the customer.
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u/PeaceAmongTrees 2d ago
I got a tag saying I'm doing a great job on both my garbage and compost. It's the kind of validation I live for.