They went through my skip!

[IncognitoUsername]

Is this a thing? We have a skip outside as we have been doing some decorating/clearing out. I heard a van outside the house which seemed to have stopped so I looked out and two blokes were rummaging in the skip! I went downstairs to ask what they were doing but they had just left. I noticed some metal items had gone out of the skip.
Is this normal? Do people just drive round looking for skips to have a nose in? I’m not bothered by them taking stuff out but surely it would have been polite to ask?!

Normal I think. A house down the road had the original interior doors in their skip! Previous owners of our house had put in plain and out of period doors so we took the ones from the skip, stripped them and hung them in our house. We did ask the neighbours though before we took them who were happy for us to take them; sort of surprised they didn’t want to sell them but 🤷‍♀️

it’s only polite to ask the owners of the skip imo, unless there’s a note that it’s freecyling.

This. It’s preferable to people putting their stuff in it which is what often happens

Our local skip man is really reasonable. He keeps his prices down by cashing in the scrap.

I’ve asked to take something out of a skip before. I rung on the doorbell and asked and the guy looked way more put out that I’d bothered him and asked rather than just took it 🤷‍♀️. It’s was a piece of plasterboard off cut the perfect size for a small DIY job I needed to do.

It’s theft by finding. Did you get the registration number?

It's normal. But they should always ask first

Sorry op but I love things from skips 😂 I mean I might knock and ask if I could take XYZ but if it’s in the skip you’re chucking it so isn’t it better if I can reuse something!!

Stuff going into landfill = bad
Stuff removed from skip for recycling/upcycling = good

Why not offer all the good stuff to a charity shop, and then on freecycle or a local forum such as Nextdoor? Better than dumping useable goods.

It's unlawful to take things from a skip or a bin because of section 1 of the Theft Act 1968

1 Basic definition of theft.

(1)A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it; and “thief” and “steal” shall be construed accordingly.

(2)It is immaterial whether the appropriation is made with a view to gain, or is made for the thief’s own benefit.

People sometimes get prosecuted for taking things from a bin or a skip.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13037808

It's fairly obvious really. It maybe that you yourself want to sell the metal on in the skip. The fact it is in a bin or a skip at face value means that you intend it to be disposed of - it's not abandoned in law in the street. The disposer's intention is for it not be taken by others but to be destroyed with normal household rubbish or recycled. Like I said it's not legally abandoned.

Think of it this way, say you throw out your private love letters or printed emails into the bin. Your intention is for that to go to the tip and never be seen again. It's no answer for your neighbour to say - oh well I thought because the recycle bin was on the street for collection it was ok for me to have a rifle through it and get what I wanted.

[which btw is why you should cut up or shred any personal information including bills/invoices/ bank details before putting them in any bin that is left out for collection because people do go through bins]

but @IncognitoUsername yes it is a thing. scrap metal collectors are notorious for going round looking for metal anywhere. go to sleep and they'll whip off your glasses for the frames!

Legally it’s theft. Simple first year law degree problem. Doesn’t matter where the skip was

and presumably when she bought it in 1995 it was something like £315K and now worth £5 mil!

I looked out of my front window once and saw two men stomping about in the skip on my drive. I'm afraid I did open the front door with a flourish and tell them off- not for taking things, I have no problem with that, but for not knocking and asking. As it was, there was a lot of broken glass and sharp metal rods in there, and I'm not sure of the legal position if they'd hurt themselves on those. If they'd knocked and asked I could've warned them.

I do love the metal collectors around here though. Anything metal is left at the end of the drive and gone within a day. Wonderful service.

This happened when we had our bathrooms done before Christmas.

To be honest, I was OK with it as it presumably saved the radiators and old taps going into landfill. It also freed up more space in the skip.

I would have had kore problem with someone dumping their stuff in the skip, as it was properly full when it was collected.

I'd be happy if people took stuff out and made it go away leaving me more room to use.

I'd be unhappy if people thought it was okay to dump their own rubbish in my paid for skip.

Despite posts on here to the contrary, literally no skip business owner is putting metal into landfill because a) landfill costs money per tonne and b) they can sell the metal on for money in the same way scrap metal dealers can.

So by extracting it from skips they essentially make money twice.

We were having our kitchen done and into an empty skip went our old very heavy range cooker, it took six guys to get it out of the house and in the skip. It was gone within the hour and I’ll never know how they managed to get it out and into a van, but it left us with a completely empty skip.

When we have a skip I post on our local Facebook Freecycle group and tell people to come and look! I'd rather stuff was reused than binned.

Absolutely this!

Why do you want them to ask? You are throwing the stuff away. It’s not like they need to ask you if you want that stuff as you clearly don’t.

one of the school mums told a tale of how she had a go at some men going through her skip.

I cannot in anyway get my head around this weird passiveness of stuff you are literally throwing away!

Last time I had a skip this happened frequently. I had so much stuff to get rid of I was delighted to get up every morning and discover large quantities of my discarded junk had disappeared overnight. I'd almost certainly have needed a second skip otherwise.

The scrap metal collectors went through it more than once and eventually I just left it out the front and it was always gone within the hour

Yes, it's a thing.

Aye the police will be on their knees thanking op for calling them so they can solve the case of the stolen rubbish 😂 how bloody silly!

Its still theft as they have taken it off your property, so you have every right to phone the police and report them. We’ve had rubbish in a pile at the side of the house whilst renovating (in amongst building materials), so its no different to people coming along and stealing stuff in a pile by your house. As you said, you were thinking of changing your mind and selling something.

They should have knocked on your door abd asked about the skip items, not just taken things.

The advice to call the police is pretty wild - you are paying someone to take away the stuff in the skip, but if a different person takes it you’d report them to the police??

What should be criminal is sticking perfectly useable furniture into landfill instead of making some effort to put it back into use. Skip divers are doing society a favour.

Technically it's theft - but police will be even less interested in 'skip lifting' than logging calls on 101...