Retailers of white goods should take old ones away

Law? They are not a charity seriously some people

I don't really see the problem OP? Most retailers give the option of disposal of the old one but not everyone needs to or wants to If they are donating it / giving to someone else etc - so it needs to be optional

If you are silly enough not to select the disposal option then that's up to you

You do realise you can list any white goods on a local Facebook free stuff group and you'll have at least 10 responses from people wanting to collect in about 5 minutes right? Even if you say it's knackered and broken they'll bite your hands off for it.

I know some people who just leave them outside their houses and they're gone within the hour even without advertising on FB, but that probably depends on where you live.

I live on a private road, house isn't visible from the street, I put an old broken clothes airer out with a view to getting rid of it later, and within 2 days my security camera picked up 2 women walking off with it at 2am. How they knew it was there in a dead end road I'll never know.

We bought a new bed recently and they charged £100 for delivery, installing and removing the old bed, mattress and packaging. Well worth it, but they actually waivered the cost when I asked them if we could get a deal on the price.

It's law that they have to take waste electricals away or provide a disposal method.

But it does cost them to transport it away and dispose of it, plus they then need a waste carriers licence to do so and a lot of paperwork to fill out for every disposal.
£20 is very reasonable and it is on the individual to not flytip, nobody is making them flytip and they would easily find £20 for something else wouldn't they?

Realistically, one way or another, you have to pay for waste. As PPs have said, that's either at point of pick up.or will be built into the cost of the product....

Then the cost would just be built-in , and you’d be paying for the service even if you didn’t want to use it.

Of course they would. They'd have to. The removal costs them money!

I think offering the service for cheaper than the local council is fine. If someone is renovating a house for example, it's possible they have already paid for another method of waste disposal. I expect it makes it easier for the company to plan jobs if they know in advance how many disposals they need to do that day. If someone has paid for a service they're less likely to mess you around and decide they do or don't need it on the day. I assume the place which ulimately recycles/landfills the broken items needs to know in advance how much waste they're taking in each day.

This. Why should we all have to pay a hidden cost as we all may not want to use it. What a stupid suggestion!

Our local white goods shop fits everything and removes old items as part of the cost.

They also deliver for free and have often beaten us home from the shop

It's not the responsibility of the retailer to remove old products for free. That's down to the consumer. Most retailers offer a removal service that is usually cheaper than a council collection.

I think the person getting rid of something should need to factor in disposal of their item. if that means paying £20 for the ease of having it taken straight away then great.

You say yourself, if you can afford new white goods you can afford £20 for disposal. I think customers should retain the ability to dispose of their own though.

Also not everyone buying (eg) a washing machine has an old one to dispose of anyway. It might be a first home, maybe they've given away or sold an older working machine. Why should they have to pay an inflated price for disposal of a non existent machine.

Dealing with fly tipping is a separate issue.

I'm not sure how that could work.

Would the delivery team have to take it?

What about if you wanted to put it as a spare in the garage? Or give it to your DS for his new home? Or use it for shelving?

So would the deliverers have to fudge some paperwork to say customer refused to hand over the old appliance?

Or if it were compulsory that they offer to take it, isn't that exactly the same as what happens now?

All I can see is that they put the price of all items up by £20 and that covers their costs of taking some items away with a bit left over they can put down as profit.

But retailers are already required to provide take-back services for waste electrical goods. These services are free in-store, but they are allowed to charge for the costs of collecting from the customers home.

All this is covered in the WEEE Regulations - and there will be further evolutions of these requirements under new regs which will be introduced under the 2022 Environment Act.

She specifically said all retailers of white goods should take the old one away for free.
It's the first sentence of her second paragraph.

She literally says they “should take the old one away for free.”

Why should it be free!???

Why should it be law? Ridiculous comment. Just another example of people wanting everyone else to sort things out for them. It should be law that you have to dispose of your old one properly more than anything else.

The OP wasn’t suggesting that it should be taken away for free.

the OP was suggesting that if suppliers were required to take away the old appliance it would reduce the fly tipping

Yes, I agree. £20 added on to my £650 washing machine - plumbed in, working, the old one removed? Worth it.

Same here. Post on a local group you have an oven/dishwasher etc....... for scrap and you will have someone message you ASAP and it will be gone within the hour.

I think it should be made law that all retailers of white goods should take the old one away free.

Fine - al that would mean is that the cost of every new washing machine or dishwasher increases by £20. Because nothing is "free". Also, have you ever tried to move a washing machine without trolleys??