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?!

That's my point! 🙄

I’ve just gone from this page of Mumsnet to Facebook and someone has put a picture of their skip on the local community page saying help yourself!🤣 (Yorkshire)

Oh my word....That's really lovely..I remember those from my childhood... ''Rabone! Rabone!'' with a bell, but the clip clop of hooves was the main giveaway.

FFS MN is incredible at times.

If someone isn't aware of a particular process or activity then it can only be utterly stupid. Do you ever stop to think that you might not know everything about everything?

You can hire scrap metal skips specifically for the purpose of storing and then removing the valuable scrap metals for recycling during a house refurb.

We had one when our previous house was fully stripped out before extending and refitting all the wiring, plumbing, heating, etc. We got hundreds for the metal that was removed and it's even more valuable now.

God forbid anyone would want their own property not to be stolen...

The guys who do it are quite young - a son who took it over from his dad, does it with his son, so long may it last! That family have been rag and bone men for generations.

It’s a lost tradition in this country, I’m glad it’s managing to survive somewhere.

@Ouchmyarse This was my childhood style- often a Coloured Cob with this style of vehicle. Under the Westway, Notting Hill.

???? "Skip man makes his money"

Do you have a skip man that offers delivery & collection in exchange for metals ?

You need to get a lockable skip then. I would not be leaving valuable items unsecured outside.

The scrap metal guys took my old garage door and some other bits. The asked first, can’t remember if they knocked or I was already outside.

But a new heating system in a skip can hardly be described as scrap.

For some people they have limited space. So the skip can be used as storage of materials before use.

You don't have the right to assume anything about property on someone else's land. Because it is their property. On their land.

People don't have the right to come on your land and take your property. Whether it is in a place they recognise as storage, or for disposal, or not.

Otherwise people could legally come onto someone else's land and take anything and claim it was not "in storage" or "clearly there for disposal" as a defence.

I got really pissed off when we were clearing DM's house as not only was stuff in the skip viewed as fair game but so was anything nearby. I had to stop a couple of idiots taking the front gates. We'd had to take them off to get the skip on the drive and had moved them further down but the cheeky sods tried to take them. Another one tried to take the plant pots from the garden!

This happened at my old address, the drive the skip was on was very small and sort of raised because we were on a hill. The kids were only tiny and were terrified by suddenly seeing men climbing over the skip right in front of the window when they were watching TV.
DP went out and told them they we didn't mind them taking stuff but they could have knocked the door first!

I'm glad too.
The Cobs were always well cared for. Our Coalman used to use a horse and cart as well..

Bit of etiquette here

1. Skips on the road? game on for skip dipping. it's going to landfill anyway.
2. Skips on a drive? No, you don't go onto peoples property , you don't actually walk onto someone's drive. If you can see something you'd like, knock on the door.
3. Never , ever put your own stuff in a skip. Don't be that CF.

Oh, and for Gods sake don't phone the police if people take stuff out of your skip, that's just ridiculous and waste of the polices time,

I found it oddly mortifying when people did this when I had one. Cars were pulling over so they could have a good old rummage at one point. Couldn't imagine someone coming into my kitchen and inspecting all the rubbish and it's the same on a larger scale! It really was all crap. Anything worth having and I'd have put it to one side and said it was free to anyone.

I would expect ppl to ask if it was on my drive. But if its on the street filled with plants, and household stuff thrown out no need to ask. I once saw a local skip filled with garden waste, and some small shrubs, and bulbs. So we took some bin bags and picked them out. Any way a women came out and ranted that ppl had made a mess, and we pointed out that it was not us. She then demanded money for the plants. So I basically said stuff that, and we left. They were not expensive large plants just your every day ones. And they were more like cuttings .

Call the police?! Honestly, brilliant post. What are you going to say “I’ve thrown some unwanted stuff in a skip and some bloke took it, send 3 units and a SWOT team ASAP”…?

Yes, very normal. We had an extension done and put loads of stuff in the skip. Had multiple people going through it. One even knocked on the door and asked us if we had any more wood panels lol I didnt mind at all- was grateful they were taking it so I didnt have to!

The skip was on our driveway btw

I skip dive for firewood- street skips are fair game, but I'd never dive for wood if someone has a skip on their driveway.

It's cheeky when people fling filled dog poo bags in skips, too.

Might even send Armed unit if they feel it's warranted. 🚨

You've chucked it out, why do you care? better they make use of it.

I think it's really rude to take things out of the skip if it's on your land. That happened to us even though I was in most of the time. I felt that people must have been watching to see when I went out. Only a couple of people knocked on the door and asked.

Best get the chopper in the air too, thermal tracking cameras activated, chase these guys down before they take someone else’s old clothing airer out of a skip.

Someone on our estate borrowed a friend’s pushchair as her dh had gone to work with their’s in the boot.
She returned from the shops, took dc out of pushchair upstairs to cot.
Got back down and the pushchair had gone, the same day we’d had a scrap metal van come round.
Poor woman was furious as she had to replace the pushchair.

It's people jumping THEIR shit into the skip that pisses me off.

Damn right, this happened to us. Was furious...