Waste duty of care for businesses: the plain guide

If your business produces waste, the law says you are responsible for it until it is properly dealt with, even after it has left your premises. That sounds alarming. In practice it comes down to three checks and keeping the right paperwork, and a good carrier does most of it for you.

What is the duty of care?

It is a legal duty in section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. It applies to every business that produces, carries, stores, treats or receives waste: a shop, an office, a café, a builder, a garage. Size makes no difference.

In plain words, you must take reasonable steps to make sure your waste does not escape, is handed only to someone allowed to take it, is described properly when it goes, and is not dumped or dealt with illegally further down the line. The government's code of practice says you should make sure your waste is managed correctly "throughout its complete journey to disposal or recovery". Handing a sack over does not hand over the duty.

Your three checks before you hand waste over

Print this out and keep it by the bins:

1. 01Is the carrier registered? Ask for their registration number and look it up on the free public register. In England it is the Environment Agency register. Make sure the number is in date, the name matches the firm on the invoice, and they are upper tier if they carry waste for other people. Our guide to checking a waste carrier licence shows how in half a minute.
2. 02Is the waste described correctly? The description on the paperwork should match what is actually in the bin or skip, with the right EWC code, the six-digit code for that type of waste. If you start throwing out something new, such as old electrical items or food, tell the carrier first. Some waste, such as fluorescent tubes or paint, is hazardous and travels on different paperwork.
3. 03Do you know where it is going? Ask the carrier which site takes your waste, and whether that site is allowed to accept it. A proper carrier answers that straight away. Our guide to waste permits and exemptions explains what a site needs.

Write down when you checked. If anything ever goes wrong, a note that says you looked up the carrier on a given date is the reasonable step the law asks for.

The paperwork you should get back, and keep

Every time waste leaves your business, you should get a waste transfer note. It records what the waste was, how much, who handed it over and who took it, and both of you sign it. If the same waste is collected regularly by the same carrier, one note called a season ticket can cover up to a year of collections.

Keep your copies for at least two years, on paper or electronically. Hazardous waste travels on a consignment note instead, and you keep those for three years. If an Environment Agency or council officer asks to see your notes, you have seven days to produce them.

Some carriers make this easy. A carrier using LoadSnap's Business plan can give you your own login to the producer portal, where you can see every collection from your premises and download each transfer note yourself, whenever you need it.

What happens if your waste is fly-tipped by someone else

Fly-tipped waste is often traced back to the business it came from. Councils go through dumped bags and rubble for anything with a name on it: delivery labels, invoices, packaging with a shop's address. The first question they ask that business is who took the waste away, and the second is to see the paperwork.

If you can show you checked the carrier and kept a proper transfer note, you have done what the law asks. If you cannot, you are in trouble even though someone else did the dumping:

• Not producing your transfer notes when asked can bring a £300 fixed penalty, payable within 14 days.
• Breaching the duty of care, for example by handing waste to an unregistered man with a van, is an offence with no upper limit on the fine a court can give.

Simpler Recycling: what it asks of your workplace

In England, Simpler Recycling means workplaces must keep three kinds of waste apart for collection: dry recyclables (plastic, metal, glass, paper and card), food waste, and everything else. Paper and card should normally go separately from the other recyclables, unless your collector has a written assessment saying they can be collected together.

It has applied to businesses with ten or more employees since 31 March 2025. Micro-firms, with fewer than ten full-time equivalent employees, have until 31 March 2027. The Environment Agency enforces it. Wales has had its own workplace recycling rules since 6 April 2024, which ask for even more separation.

Questions people ask

Is a waste carrier responsible once they take my waste?

Both of you are, each for your own part. The carrier is responsible for moving it legally and taking it to the right place. You stay responsible for having chosen a proper carrier and described the waste correctly.

Do I need to check every time?

The law does not set a timetable. Good practice is to check when you start using a carrier and at least once a year after that, and again whenever the firm's name or vehicles change.

LoadSnap team

UK waste compliance

Written by the team building LoadSnap, the UK waste compliance platform for carriers and receivers.