Once a property or site becomes vacant, the risk of fly-tipping incidents on that land increase massively. During holiday periods, particularly Christmas, households accumulate more waste and packaging and also replace household appliances more often than normal. This all leads to a higher rate of fly-tipping incidents throughout the UK.

According to an article from The Guardian – “From March 2020 to March 2021 in England, 1.13m fly-tipping incidents were dealt with by local authorities, an increase of 16% on the 980,000 reported in the previous year, according to data released by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on Wednesday. Higher numbers of incidents were reached in 2007-09, but the way the data is collated has changed, so direct comparisons with years before 2018 are not possible.

Despite the increase in numbers, the number of enforcement actions went down over the period, with only 456,000 actions taken, compared with 474,000 in the year 2019-2020.”

Fly-tippers tend to be opportunists who scour local places looking for quiet or abandoned areas in which to dump their waste, and vacant properties are the ideal location. Once your property receives a fly-tipping incident, there is usually a knock-on effect where the sight of abandoned rubbish tends to lead others to follow suit and before you know it, you are left with a significant and costly problem.

Fly-tipping isn’t just an unsightly issue, it’s also a significant health and safety hazard as piles of abandoned waste will certainly attract rats and other vermin looking for food or material for nesting. Particularly during the autumn and winter months, rats move indoors to keep warm and hoard food within properties, so it’s very important to ensure that all waste is kept to a minimum to avoid infestation. With the ongoing pandemic and the increase in vacant properties, rat and mice infestations are on the rise causing significant damage to buildings, electrics and pipework whilst also posing a serious health and safety threat.

Professional clearance services

Clearing properties or sites not only gets rid of unwanted, unsightly waste, but it also has many other health & safety and insurance benefits. For example, excess rubbish and waste can pose a higher risk of fire within properties and extreme cases can often affect insurance claims.

Our specialist clearance teams can offer 2 types of service to help deal with fly-tipping incidents.

Preventative measures

Our team can apply temporary measures such as CCTV or perimeter security to reduce the likelihood of fly-tipping incidents on your property. We believe that a deterrent is the best method to securing your site, so we can also install warning signage to alert would-be offenders that the site is being monitored. We have found this to be highly efficient in dramatically reducing the number of fly-tipping incidents in problem areas.

Reactive measures

Our specialist clearance services teams can immediately remove waste to help prevent land being seen as a preferable dumping spot for likeminded offenders. We work with our environmental service partners to dispose of all waste safely and responsibly to ensure that as much as possible can be recycled or reused rather than ending in landfill. Orbis are SafePPQ verified, ISOQAR registered, an Environment Agency Registered Carrier and are fully compliant with the Waste Electric and Electronic Regulations (WEEE).

Alongside general fly-tipping removal, we also provide a host of other clearance services –

Needle sweeps

Our highly trained needle sweep and sharps teams have many years of experience in the removal of needles and syringes. Our teams will quickly and safely remove such items from all types of commercial or domestic properties, before disposing of them responsibly through our accredited waste partners. This service will often undergo a deep cleaning process to ensure that affected areas are also decontaminated to remove the risk of contamination and health and safety hazards.

Hoarding clearance

Hoarding items and waste is often a complex mental issue that often stems from everyday people becoming unwilling to let go of possessions, which can sometimes spiral out of control. We understand that each case has its own back story and our teams are highly mindful of this when undergoing these types of clearances. We will work with the customer and resident to remove waste from these properties in a manner that best suits each individual situation.

Hazardous waste removal

We pride ourselves on providing a hazardous waste collection service that is both safe and quick for our customers. Our team are highly trained to remove all types of hazardous material, from aerosols, paint and oils, to batteries or toxic items. All operatives are fully trained and properly equipped with the latest PPE to ensure absolute safety for our customers and all waste is then responsibly disposed through our environmental partners.

Fly-tipping Tips

• Try to restrict access to your land by installing gates or physical barriers (strategically placed earth mounds, tree trunks, boulders etc.) to prevent access to the land.
• Make sure when erecting a barrier, that you are not permanently blocking a public right of way or critical access.
• Make sure gates are closed and, if possible, locked when not in use.
• Install or improve lighting to create better visibility so that fly-tippers are not hidden from view. Fly-tippers prefer to operate out of sight.
• Place appropriate deterrent signage and CCTV cameras to ensure that fly-tippers are aware of the enhanced security. An effective deterrent is certainly the best course of action where possible.
• Swiftly clear any waste that is dumped to remove any encouragement for others to add to it.

With over 40 years of experience, we have become the trusted experts in Specialist Clearance Services, managing over 60,000 properties each year. Working with a wide variety of businesses, authorities and organisations, our national teams are professionally trained to handle extreme cases, from severe hoarding incidents to drug dens and hazardous waste that most companies simply cannot or will not manage.

We’re here to help

We tailor every service to meet our customers individual needs and our national reach of over 20 locations and 450+ field operatives enable us to efficiently cover all regions across the UK and Northern Ireland. Our rapid response service also ensures that we can cover our customers for any emergency situations, providing complete peace of mind.

If you would like more information or any advice, then please get in touch today and we will be happy to help.