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We get them here sometimes. My mums a few miles away and they're round every week!

Meant to say - when our old washing machine went they took one of the numbers off our door so it looked like we lived at number 5 rather than number 54. It was not screwed on properly but honestly did they actually think we didnt need it We replaced it so we now have one nice new shiney number 4 and a rusty old 5. It looks silly should really replace the 5

The scrap metal guys come round but don't shout out. If you leave any metal/appliances etc out they disappear very quickly. No need to pay anyone to take things away.

Really? 42 years young and have never, ever had even an echo of a scrap man.

Will they take an old dehumidifer do you think?

Doesn't need to - he lives next door :D

When I moved intO a flat in Dalston a can of drink got punctured in my boot. I left it behind a wheel of the car whilst we carried stuff in, intending to put it in the bin when we came back. It was gone when we came back! This prompted me to leave a broken flat screen monitor outside the door rather than take it to the tip. It was gone in ten minutes :D

Plomino I can't stop laughing at "Is crap?"

We have an Eastern European man and his teenage son, collecting scrap in a Tesco shopping trolley.

I think the fastest record was when I put my old Dyson on the driveway at 2.45pm and it was gone by 2.55pm when I went to do the school run.

Annoy old iroooooonn

I was locked out sat on my doorstep texting once and the scrap van went past..they shouted
brrriiing brrriiing its for yooouuu!
Made me smile. They come round at least once a week. They cleared some stuff for my mum the day before her wedding and they gave her a lucky horseshoe.

We don't get a scrap man. We get a succession of very suspect looking men in battered transit vans bugging the hell out of the doorbell, asking for anything they like the look of in the front garden. The fucking bastards stole a cast iron bath, some copper pipe and the brand new spare tyre from my car.
We were taking the bathroom out. We took the pipe out of the front door, returned for the bath and the pipe went. Went in for the floor sweepings and the bath went! The tyre was leaning against my car waiting for me to finish the bathroom and put it on th car!
I wouldn't mind but we live in a seriously rural area and have a large set back front garden!
It actually made me quite nervous about being so isolated.

We get them here too, north Wales.

Often it's the local traveller community and they often knock and ask what you have. I had about five of them in my house last year taking away my old fridgefreezer and some manky old baby gates. They were very nice and helpful. They have always knocked if they see something of interest in the gardens. I've only ever had something taken that I was a bit annoyed about but id left it in the garden for weeks and some bugger too it.

They do come round with a truck with a megaphone thing on top shouting IROOOON, ANY IROOON though.

We get them regularly, they shout " ayeeeeeeeeyon. Any old scrap ayeeeeeeeeyon"
They made my day once when they shouted across the street to me saying they don't normally take beautiful women but in my case they'd make an exception.

Ours have a knackered old siren that sounds like a dying ambulance.

We have had the scrapman round a few times in tha last year..never seen him before. He has a hunting type horn

Really loud and annoying sounding horn. But useful as you hear them three streets away so can be ready when they get to you.

We keep getting more and more coming round, we have a massive traveller community, but recently there's been Eastern European men doing it too. They don't shout, just beep.

We have a few round here (London), they just cruise the streets looking for stuff in people's front gardens, but they don't yell or toot.

The other day we put something out the front, DP then went out and within a couple of minutes of him going the scrap guys turned up. I thought they must have been psychic until DP told me that he'd seen them at the end of the road and said we had something in the front garden

Ours don't shout they just drive about on the lookout. We have a large traveller community nearby

When we had building done apparently they knocked and asked for an old radiator.

When we had our boiler replaced the plumber made - I thought! - a heck of a song and dance getting the old one off the wall and out of the house. "These are really heavy" he groaned. I thought: wimp.

Getting ready to take it to the tip, DH and I couldn't lift it into the car between us!

Neighbours were out so there was no one we could ask to help. And I couldn't magine how we'd get it out when we got to the tip. So I said to DH "Just leave it out the front and with any luck the travellers will have it."

DH said "They wouldn't just take it!!" - well it was gone the next day.

I am not sure how I would have felt if I had actually wanted it . . .

We also have a very old fashioned and charming gentleman - immaculately dressed and like a stereotyped pawnbroker from a bad sitcom - who knocks about twice a year asking for any antiques or gold. When I mentioned that I did have some spare old crappy 9 carat argos gold jewellery in a box right at the back of the loft where I can't get to it, he was really trying to encourage me to go up and get it then and there. Errr no mate I am not spending 48 hours battling through our nightmare of a loft for £8 of gold.

We get them come around a few times a day in their pick up trucks. We just leave the stuff out and it's got within the hour. We call them the metal fairies. Don't get any money, but it saves a trip to the tip, or paying the council to pick it up.

In Sarf East London you know not to leave anything out the front you don't want to disappear.

I have moved into a er...different area and yes we have a scrap van or three that are all in competition with each other.

They do not shout though - just scout round peoples houses looking for dumped goods. They are often found sieving through any skips etc in hi-viz

"Where the hell do you lot live ?! grin I've never seen this in my life!"

We live in rural South Yorkshire and never get a rag and bone man round. I wish we did though. I have had to pay the council to take away large items, and went to the tip yesterday with a car load of stuff.

We get lots,some of them not very nice.My friend lives in an isolated farm and they threatened to come and burn her and her children out if she didn't hand some scrap over,they then went to another farm and threatened to kill the owner because he wouldn't let them have an old car he'd got.Then they went to our farm and verbally abused my uncle because he wouldn't give them anything.They were stupid enough to leave a business card,so everyone concerned rang the police,who refused to do anything because it was only our words against theirs.We all know that really it was because the scrappies came from a notorious traveller site and the police don't go on there if they can help it.

I've had stuff nicked from the front garden too.I'd put it there for my dad to collect for his scrap heap and someone stole it.

Sparkling, that is funny! Love it!

Faith, the same thing happened to me after a fire. The insurers needed the washer which caused it but it got nicked! That was when I lived in Leigh near Wigan. Now on a part council/owned estate in Manchester.

There were 2 scallies in my garden once after some sofas I'd left for Free cycle. It was after midnight and I scared them by striking up a conversation with them. One ran off the other panicked.

We get them round once or twice a week. And some people in an upholstery company van which drives into our cul-de-sac and out again every week or two who I assume are also scrap-merchants, although they seem a bit dodgy...